Illiterate Prophet, Divine Text?

Examining the Claim that Muhammad's Supposed Illiteracy Proves that the Qur'an was Inspired by Allah

Muslim believers, following the lead of the traditions (hadiths), often heap praise on Muhammad as someone who had impressive abilities in a wide range of areas. Yet, in one area they insist on knocking him down a few pegs, to the point where one might even question his intelligence. You see, orthodox Muslim opinion insists that Muhammad was literate.

There is obviously a clear theological reason behind this claim.

According to true believers, the supposed miraculous character of the Qur’an is confirmed by the fact that Muhammad could not read or write. As an illiterate person, he would not have had the ability to compose and write down his own thoughts, and then give credit for the words to Allah. Therefore, the Qur’an must be miraculous, or so it is claimed.

The first and most basic response to this claim is simply to state that one does not need to be literate to produce great literature. The Iliad and the Odyssey are two of the foundational documents of Western civilization. Yet, it is widely believed that the person who wrote them was also unable to read and write in the technical sense. Tradition states that the poet Homer was blind, yet he was still able to dictate his thoughts to scribes and secretaries who wrote them down in the form of these epic poems.

Homer obviously did not write these works with his own hands, but no one would deny his authorship (or that of any other blind person who writes a book by way of dictation). It is, therefore, of very little consequence whether Muhammad could physically write letters on a page. Even if he could not, he could still be recognized as the author of any book conceived in his mind and then dictated to others.

Having said the above, I still believe that it is possible to prove from respected sources that Muhammad was not illiterate. I base this on the following:

• Muslim tradition states that Muhammad was a successful merchant before embarking on his prophetic career. Trading activity throughout the Roman Empire would almost certainly have required him to learn Roman numerals (I, V, X, L, D and M) as these were used to represent numbers before the popularization of Arabic numerals. It would have taken a peculiarly incurious mind to not move beyond these letters and learn the rest of the letters of the alphabet as well.

• The very first words of the Qur’an (as found in Qur’an 96:1 is a command to recite or read (iqra). It would be very strange if Muhammad ignored this foundational command and simply continued on his illiterate way.

• The word (ummi) traditionally seen by Muslims as testifying to Muhammad’s illiteracy (for example, Qur’an 7:157 can be translated in a variety of other ways. It can, for example, be rendered as ‘gentile’ indicating that Muhammad did not come from the numbers of the ‘People of the Book’ (Jews and Christians).

• The Qur’an implores Muslims to be diligent in seeking wisdom. It also contains many prayers for an increase of knowledge (cf. Qur’an 20:114. Increasing in knowledge is something that is very difficult to do if you are illiterate. Are we, therefore, to understand that Allah’s prophet was at least partially disobedient (by not becoming literate) to this foundational command?

• There are clear references in the Qur’an to reading and writing activity by Muhammad. For example, in the verse in which he is accused of copying ‘tales of the ancients’, reference is made to Muhammad dictating words. (Qur’an 25:5)

In summary it can, therefore, be stated that the question of Muhammad’s supposed illiteracy proves nothing about the divine origins of the Qur’an. It is, furthermore, quite possible that he was in fact literate.

For a thorough investigation of the truth-claims of Islam, please see my book ‘Questioning Islam - Tough Questions and Honest Answers About the Muslim Religion’.

Kind regards,

Peter

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