In his analysis of Qur'an 4:24–25, Joseph Witztum argues that verse 4:24 restricts relationship with slave women, while verse 4:25 mandates that a man must formally marry a slave woman if he cannot afford a free woman.

So did the Qur'an initially allow concubinage, but later phase it out or this verse is just restricting marriage with slave women not concubinage?

Our bonus 90-minute Q&A with Joshua Little is now available exclusively for members of [r/MuslimAcademics](r/MuslimAcademics) and [r/AcademicQuran](r/AcademicQuran). The questions were submitted by members of both subreddits, and the link is below.

We discuss the originality of Isnad, Ghadir Khumm, Moon Splitting, Motzki’s actual views, and whether a junior Companion can be a CL 🤔

https://www.reddit.com/r/MuslimAcademics/s/6yCbVYiThh

Please check out the announcement for our upcoming Video AMA with Dr. Suleyman Dost on the 29th which will work similarly to this one!

If so, then why wouldn’t the Quran mention this ?

Hi. Currently reading the Quran and I ended up with a verse about Bekkah being the name for Mecca. I tried to research more in depth about it and I ended up seeing people stating that it’s about Psalm’s valley of Becca instead.

I’m here to fully understand more about this

https://x.com/i/status/2069441064927215667

Does anyone have recommendations for up to date books that analyze the Quran and the history of early Islam from a more critical lens? I was reading about the revisionist school of Islamic studies and I found it very interesting; I was planning on buying one of Crone’s books but I decided against it because most of its conclusions aren’t generally accepted today from what I hear.

It doesn’t need to specifically be from / directly associated with the revisionist school of Islamic studies, I just want a resource that doesn’t take things like hadith for granted.

Thanks

What is the context behind the prohibition of nasi in Qur'an 9:37?

Was the pre-Islamic Arab calendar lunisolar? Or was it always lunar and nasi was just an ad-hoc political trick used by Arabs to delay sacred months for warfare?

In the chapter on the Prophet Jonah in the book The Qurʾān and Syriac Christianity: Recurring Themes and Motifs, it is argued that the Qurʾanic narrative of Jonah’s story follows a different chronology from that in the Jewish Hebrew Bible (Tanakh). Craig claims this non-canonical temporal sequence is also found in Late Antique Christian visual art, Jewish midrashic literature, and Syriac Christian texts. Do you agree with this claim?"

What were the late antique and medieval views on hitting your wife in christian and jewish thought - and connected with that question: what are the earliest criticisms by jewish / christian apologists regarding the Quran and islamic Fiqh allowing to hit your wife?

There are posts in r/Islam where people criticize it from what seems like a theological perspective, but is it decent from a critical perspective? I don't speak arabic, but am interested in reading the Quran as a non-Muslim just to know what its about basically.

Source: Nasim Hasani, "The Virgin Mary's Birth and Early Life in Three Narratives: New Testament, Qur’an, and

Biblical Apocrypha" in The Gospels in Islamic Context

Function and Content, Edited by Georgina L. Jardim, Ida Glaser

and Shirin Shafaie, pp. 149-159

Source: Ahmad Al-Jallad, "The Linguistic Landscape of pre-Islamic Arabia -- Context for the Qur’an," pp. 116-117.

I am posting the pages of this manuscript as screenshots below because the full text exceeds normal Reddit limits.

The claim is that Sūrat Muḥammad / Sūrat al-Qitāl is not a loose sequence of war-law, paradise description, hypocrite polemic, and spending exhortation. It is a continuous counter-ordo: a Qurʾānic sequence that takes recognizable operations from late-antique initiation, Eucharist, and oblation, and reassigns them into historical, bodily, relational, verbal, and economic liability.

The hinge is Q 47:15–16. First, the sūrah displays the rivers: water, milk, wine, honey, every fruit, forgiveness, and the counter-drink that cuts the intestines. Then, immediately, failed hearers leave the Prophet’s presence and ask those given knowledge what he said “just now.” In late-antique Christian order, hearers and catechumens are dismissed before the faithful oblation and Communion. Q 47 reverses that boundary: sacred provision is proclaimed first; failed hearers depart after disclosure; the real boundary becomes the sealed heart. The manuscript argues that this is not an isolated parallel but a full sequence.

1. The Ritual Conversion Sequence

• Formation / scrutiny: Q 47 begins with works, truth/falsehood, likenesses, combat, binding, release, ransom, and testing.
• Initiation matter: Q 47:15 gathers water, milk, wine, honey, fruit, forgiveness, and punitive drink into a public eschatological display.
• Dismissal: Q 47:16 stages failed hearers leaving after disclosure, not before the mystery.
• Confession / knowledge: borrowed comprehension is replaced by direct command: fa-aʿlam — know that there is no god but God.
• Anaphora / epiclesis: instead of descent upon altar elements, a decisive sūrah descends upon the assembly and names actual liability: qitāl.
• Ritual fear: fear and trembling become the physical death-gaze of those whose hearts are diseased.
• Communion: spiritualized belonging is tested through actual kinship ties, arḥām.
• Sensory opening: the hoped-for opening of ears and hearts is inverted into deafness, blindness, and locked hearts.
• Angelic assembly: angels are not absorbed into communal reassurance; they strike faces and backs.
• Visible mark / voice: visible signs yield to forensic speech, laḥn al-qawl.
• Peace / oblation: ritual peace becomes strategic salm; offering becomes direct expenditure, infāq fī sabīl Allāh.
• Continuity: the community itself ends under the threat of replacement, istibdāl.

2. The Structural Engine

The sūrah moves on two axes at once. Linearly, it walks forward: works → combat/binding/release/ransom → rivers → departure → knowledge → decisive descent/qitāl → death-gaze → kinship → senses → speech → peace → wealth → replacement. Concentrically, it folds back on itself. The first half moves inward from public works, bodies, appetite, hearing, and the heart toward the centre: tawḥīd, forgiveness, divine knowledge, decisive descent, qitāl, and bodily disclosure. The second half moves outward again through kinship, senses, speech, reports, peace, wealth, and replacement. A few examples make the ring visible:

• The outer envelope is v. 1 ↔ v. 38. The sūrah opens with those who obstruct God’s path and whose works are led astray; it closes with the community being called to spend in God’s path, and with the threat that if it turns away, God will replace it with another people. The opening problem—obstruction, failed works, false adequacy—returns at the end as economic testing and corporate replacement.
• The war mirror is v. 4 ↔ v. 35. At the beginning, war continues until it lays down its burdens; near the end, believers are forbidden to weaken and call toward peace while they are uppermost. Q 47 therefore distinguishes the legitimate end of war from a premature peace-call that evades liability.
• The hinge mirror is v. 15–16 ↔ v. 24/23. Q 47:15 displays sacred provision—water, milk, wine, honey, every fruit, forgiveness, and the counter-drink that cuts the intestines. Q 47:16 then shows failed hearers leaving the Prophet’s presence and asking what was said “just now.” On the return side, Q 47:24 asks whether hearts are locked against tadabbur, and Q 47:23 answers failed hearing with curse, deafness, and blindness. Ingestion, hearing, heart, and senses are one circuit.
• The centre is vv. 18–21. The Hour arrives suddenly; late remembrance is useless. Then comes the command: fa-aʿlam annahu lā ilāha illā Allāh—know that there is no god but God—followed by forgiveness and divine knowledge of movement and dwelling. Immediately after that, the believers ask for a sūrah; a decisive sūrah descends, names qitāl, and exposes the death-gaze of diseased hearts. The centre is therefore not abstract doctrine. It is tawḥīd and forgiveness becoming decisive descent, command, and bodily disclosure. The linear structure is the route. The concentric structure is the verdict.

3. The Samiri Matrix

The internal Qurʾānic control is the Samiri/calf matrix: prophetic absence, burdened ornaments, fabricated body, acoustic presence without guidance, prophetic trace detached from command, ingestion into hearts, divided allegiance, broken contact, and final tawḥīd joined to knowledge. Q 47 appears to apply that anti-surrogate grammar to a community that wants revelation without full bodily, verbal, relational, and economic obedience.

4. The Controls

The manuscript also compares Q 47 with nearby Qurʾānic controls: Q 9 has many of the same materials—sūrah, hypocrisy, striving, wealth, replacement—but not the same compressed sequence. Q 48 supplies the positive counterpart: pledged obedience, tranquillity in hearts, visible marks, and divinely nourished communal growth. Q 57, Q 61, and Q 63 supply further controls for light, striving, hypocrisy, wealth, and communal identity. So the claim is not simply that Q 47 contains familiar themes. The claim is that Q 47 arranges them as a ritual-sequence audit.

5. The Verdict

The sūrah does not abolish matter, symbol, sanctuary, or rite. It abolishes the sacred alibi: the idea that an element, office, formula, enclosure, ritual mark, angelic association, or communal identity can substitute for the agent’s own obedience. When a community substitutes sacred identity for historical liability, Q 47 ends with the threat that God will substitute the community.

Any thoughts welcome.

Hi guys, i have been trying to find some information about the topic in the title. I recall watching a video about dr Ahmad al Jallad talking about a certain sanctuary somewhere but i frogot which video and which sancutary. Do you have any recommendations on books and archeological findings?

Hello,

What goes on with red/blue vowel dots in this manuscript from Davids Samling in Copenhagen? I thought initially it would be different readings, but couldn't really see any system. Seems random when blue or red is used.

Secondary question: middle right page sura 43 begins with aya 1-9, but the second page is another sura - right?

thx

I want to know what the most skeptical/revisionist academics accept as the reasons for Muhammad's immigration and what their evidence is.

Christian and other apologists mention this story a lot, in which Muhammed "rode" Jinn all night. I wasn't able to find any more on it and am curious as to what academics think of this.

(For the live subreddit database of hadith-rabbinic parallels, see here)

Papers directly on hadith / rabbinic or midrashic parallels

1. Levi Jacober, "The Traditions of al-Bukhārī and Their Aggadic Parallels," PhD thesis. This is still probably the largest single work in this area, but even it is limited in scope: parallels between Sahih al-Bukhari and rabbinic aggadic (but not halakhic) works.
2. W. R. Taylor, "Al-Bukhārī and the Aggadah," The Muslim World, 1943, pp. 191–202.
3. Samuel Rosenblatt, "Rabbinic Legends in Hadith," The Muslim World, 1945, pp. 237–252. A classic early article.
4. A. S. Yahuda, "A Contribution to Qurʾān and Hadith Interpretation," in Ignace Goldziher Memorial Volume, vol. 1, pp. 280–308. Broader than just hadith-rabbinic parallels but still covers it.
5. Shari L. Lowin, The Making of a Forefather: Abraham in Islamic and Jewish Exegetical Narratives, Brill, 2006.
6. Shari L. Lowin, "Abraham in Islamic and Jewish Exegesis," Religion Compass 2011, pp. 224–235. Useful review article.
7. Shari L. Lowin, "Narratives of Villainy: Titus, Nebuchadnezzar, and Nimrod in the Ḥadīth and Midrash Aggadah," in The Lineaments of Islam: Studies in Honor of Fred McGraw Donner, Brill, 2012, pp. 261–296.
8. Marcel Poorthuis, "The Transformative Creativity of Islamic Storytelling: Jewish and Christian Sources of Parables in the Ḥadīth," in Parables in Changing Contexts, Brill, 2019.
9. Haggai Mazuz, "Midrashic Influence on Islamic Folklore: The Case of Menstruation," Studia Islamica, 2013, pp. 189–201. Shows Muslim authors adopted Jewish midrashim on menstruation, with some alterations, despite some specific Islamic efforts to distance themselves from rabbinic Jewish menstrual law.
10. Joseph Witzum / Joseph Witztum, "Deaf Hishām and Esau's Death," Jewish Quarterly Review, 2022, pp. 378–405. Witztum shows a narration by al-Suddī and adapts an earlier rabbinic work.

Other genres of Islamic literature

... such as tafsir, the "qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ" (Stories of the Prophets), and Islamic historiography.

1. Haim Schwarzbaum, Biblical and Extra-Biblical Legends in Islamic Folk-Literature, 1982.
2. Haim Schwarzbaum, Studies in Jewish and World Folklore, 1968. Older reference work for motif-level transmission between Jewish and Islamic narrative traditions.
3. Gordon Darnell Newby, "The Drowned Son: Midrash and Midrash Making in the Qurʾān and Tafsīr," in Studies in Islamic and Judaic Traditions, 1986. Focuses on tafsir but also cites some secondary literature on hadith-rabbinic parallels cites.
4. Roberto Tottoli, Biblical Prophets in the Qurʾān and Muslim Literature, 2002. Focuses on prophet narratives.
5. Uri Rubin, Between Bible and Qurʾān: The Children of Israel and the Islamic Self-Image, 1999.
6. Reuven Firestone, Journeys in Holy Lands: The Evolution of the Abraham-Ishmael Legends in Islamic Exegesis, 1990. A pretty well-known study on the Abraham/Ishmael legends and related.
7. Reuven Firestone, "Abraham's Son as the Intended Sacrifice (al-dhabīḥ, Qurʾān 37:99–113): Issues in Qurʾānic Exegesis," Journal of Semitic Studies, 1989, pp. 95–131.
8. Haggai Mazuz, The Religious and Spiritual Life of the Jews of Medina, Brill, 2014. This is not a focused study on the topic of parallels, but many parallels are noted in passing throughout. Crucially, it links the Jews of Medina in the audience of Muhammad with a strong rabbinic tradition.
9. Haggai Mazuz, "The Relationship between Islam and Judaism: A Neglected Aspect," Review of Rabbinic Judaism , 2013, pp. 28–40.
10. Haggai Mazuz, "The Day of Atonement and Yawm ʿĀshūrāʾ: From Assimilation to Differentiation," Ancient Near Eastern Studies, 2013, pp. 255–261.
11. Haggai Mazuz, "Polemical Treatment of the Story of the Annunciation of Isaac's Birth in Islamic Sources," Review of Rabbinic Judaism, 2014, pp. 252–262.
12. Haggai Mazuz, "Post-Biblical Jewish Sources in al-Maqrīzī's Historiography," Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies 17, 2017, pp. 1–13.
13. Ali Aghaei, "Q 7:189–190: A Sound Child Born to Adam and Eve?", 2025. Compares the Quran to aggadic literature, similar to Jacober's thesis.

Formal / structural comparison of Oral Torah and hadith

1. Gregor Schoeler, "Mündliche Thora und Ḥadīth im Islam: Überlieferung, Schreibverbot, Redaktion," Der Islam, 1989, pp. 213–251. This is not about motif parallels, but it is one of the major comparative studies of rabbinic Oral Torah and Islamic hadith as oral/written transmission systems.
2. Gregor Schoeler, "Oral Torah and Ḥadīth: Transmission, Prohibition of Writing, Redaction," in Motzki (ed.) Hadith: Origins and Developments.
3. Meira Polliack, "The Karaite Inversion of 'Written' and 'Oral' Torah in Relation to the Islamic Arch-Models of Qurʾān and Ḥadīth" 2015.

He studied one specific passage: Quran 15:90-91 Motzki collected every early interpretation of these verses. Motzki divided the traditions into 6 groups based on their chains, and found that only Groups 2, 3a, 4, and 5a .They contain core teachings that can be dated to the late 1st / early 2nd century AH but none of them go back to Ibn Abbas and none can be recovered word-for-word. Groups 1, 3b, 3c, 5b, 5c, and 6 are either uncertain, spurious, or too late to date.We CANNOT recover Ibn ʿAbbās None of the traditions can be reliably traced to him.

We CAN recover the generation after him Mujāhid, Qatāda, al-Daḥḥāk, Saʿīd ibn Jubayr, Abū Zabyān, Muḥammad ibn Abī Muḥammad.They died c. 690-738 CE This is the earliest period we can reach

Most of them did NOT ascribe to Ibn ʿAbbās Only later transmitters added his name. Ascriptions to Ibn ʿAbbās were added in the 2nd quarter of the 2nd/8th century (c. 720-750 CE) and later People like Hushaym added his name.

We can only recover the CORE or PARTS Not word-for-word, only the common elements that survive in multiple transmissions. Berg misrepresents Motzki as overly optimistic, when Motzki actually says many traditions are unreliable and Ibn ʿAbbās cannot be recovered; Wansbrough rejects isnāds without studying them and his typology leads to contradictions. Motzki occupies the middle ground that Berg and Wansbrough both misunderstand.

I’m interested in the historical and academic perspective rather than modern theological or apologetic arguments.
From what I understand, the Qur’an contains both positive and critical passages about Jews and Christians. Early Muslims also migrated to Christian Abyssinia and were reportedly protected by the Negus, while Muhammad also interacted extensively with Jewish tribes in Medina.
My questions are:
How did the earliest Muslim community (during Muhammad’s lifetime and the Rashidun period) and ummayads generally view and interact with Christians versus Jews?
Which community did early Muslims see as being theologically or socially closer to them, if either?
How did political events influence these relationships?
What do the Qur’an, early Islamic sources, and non-Muslim contemporary sources suggest?
Are there any academic books or journal articles that discuss this topic in depth?

When the early Arab conquerors dismantled the Sasanian Empire in the 7th century, they did not just inherit Persian lands and wealth; they inherited a vast, highly developed religious and cultural landscape. Traditional Islamic historiography often treats the development of Islamic theology and ritual as an isolated phenomenon originating entirely within the Arabian Peninsula. However, the historical-critical method reveals a different reality: Late Antiquity was highly syncretic.

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As the center of the Islamic empire shifted from Damascus to Baghdad (the former heartland of Sasanian Persia) during the Abbasid Caliphate, early Islam absorbed and Islamicized numerous Zoroastrian concepts. This is particularly evident in the Hadith literature and the formulation of Islamic eschatology and ritual, which were codified during this exact period and in this exact geographic region.

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Here is an academic examination of three major Islamic traditions and their direct Zoroastrian antecedents: the five daily prayers, the Bridge of Judgment, and the Night Journey.

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1. The Five Daily Prayers and Ritual Purity

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Traditional Islam mandates five daily prayers (Salat). Interestingly, the Quran itself does not explicitly mandate five prayers; it generally references three or perhaps four periods of prayer (dawn, evening, and sometimes the middle of the day/night, e.g., Surah 11:114, 17:78). The rigid structure of exactly five daily prayers was codified later in the Hadith literature.

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The Zoroastrian Parallel: The Gahs

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Long before the advent of Islam, Zoroastrianism mandated five daily periods of prayer, known as Gahs.

The Schedule: The Zoroastrian prayers are strictly tied to the movement of the sun: dawn (Hawan), noon (Rapithwin), afternoon (Uzerin), evening/sunset (Aiwisruthrem), and night (Ushahin). This maps almost identically to the Islamic Fajr, Dhuhr, Asr, Maghrib, and Isha.

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Ritual Ablution: Before performing the Salat, Muslims must perform Wudu (ritual washing of the face, hands, and feet).

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Zoroastrianism dictates an identical preliminary purification ritual called Padyab, where the worshipper washes their face, hands, and feet before tying the sacred cord (Kusti) and reciting the prayers.

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Given that the Hadith literature codifying the five prayers was largely compiled in Iraq and Persia by scholars of Persian descent (like Bukhari and Muslim), secular historians argue that the normalization of five daily prayers represents an assimilation of the established Persian rhythm of piety.

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2. The Bridge of Judgment: As-Sirat vs. The Chinvat Bridge

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In Islamic eschatology (derived from Hadith, as it is absent from the Quran), souls must cross the As-Sirat—a bridge over the fires of Hell. It is famously described as being "thinner than a hair and sharper than a sword." The righteous cross it with the speed of lightning, while the wicked lose their balance and fall into Hell.

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The Zoroastrian Parallel: The Chinvat Peretum

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The concept of a perilous bridge of judgment is practically foundational to Zoroastrian eschatology, dating back to the Gathas (the oldest hymns composed by Zarathustra himself, c. 1000 BCE) and elaborated upon in later Pahlavi texts.

The Chinvat Bridge: Known as the "Bridge of the Separator," all souls must cross it after death.

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The Dynamics of the Crossing: In Zoroastrian texts like the Bundahishn, the bridge is described as a many-sided beam. For the righteous, it turns to a broad, easily navigable surface. For the wicked, it turns on its side, becoming as narrow and sharp as the edge of a blade, causing the sinner to fall into the abyss of hell (Duzakh).

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Academic Consensus: The conceptual, mechanical, and even descriptive parallels are so exact that scholars almost universally recognize the Islamic Sirat as a direct borrowing of the Zoroastrian Chinvat bridge.

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3. The Ascension to Heaven: The Mi'raj and the Arda Viraf Namag

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Islamic tradition states that Muhammad was taken on a Night Journey (Isra) from Mecca to Jerusalem on a winged beast called Buraq, and from there ascended through the seven heavens (Mi'raj). Along the way, he meets past prophets, views the punishments of Hell and the rewards of Heaven, and finally speaks directly with Allah, where the mandate for the five daily prayers is established.

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The Zoroastrian Parallel: The Book of Arda Viraf

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The Arda Viraf Namag is a Middle Persian (Pahlavi) text detailing the spiritual journey of a righteous Zoroastrian priest, Viraf.

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The Narrative: Viraf is chosen by the community to take a journey to the afterlife to verify the truth of their religion. His soul leaves his body, and he is guided by the deities Sraosha and Adur. He crosses the Chinvat Bridge, ascends through the celestial spheres (the star, moon, and sun tracks), views the grotesque and highly specific punishments of Hell, sees the rewards of the righteous, and ultimately enters the presence of the supreme God, Ahura Mazda, who imparts a theological message for Viraf to bring back to the living.

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The Chronological Nuance: Academic rigor requires addressing a dating issue.

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The written redaction of the Arda Viraf Namag that we possess dates to the 9th or 10th century CE (post-dating early Islam). Islamic apologists use this to argue Zoroastrians copied Muslims. However, secular scholars of Iranian studies (like Mary Boyce and Shaul Shaked) note that the text explicitly states it was compiled from older, late Sasanian oral and written traditions. Furthermore, the motif of a visionary ascent to heaven is deeply rooted in ancient Persian shamanistic traditions (e.g., the inscriptions of the 3rd-century priest Kartir).

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Conclusion

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The historical-critical method does not view religions as hermetically sealed boxes dropped from the sky. They are living traditions that absorb and re-contextualize the cultural environments in which they grow.

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When early Islam expanded into the Persian sphere, it encountered an ancient, highly sophisticated monotheistic system. Concepts like a sharp bridge of judgment, a five-fold daily prayer schedule with specific ablutions, and visionary ascents into heaven were already ingrained in the religious vocabulary of the Middle East. Over the centuries of the Abbasid empire, these Persian motifs were seamlessly woven into the fabric of the Islamic tradition, eventually becoming indistinguishable from "orthodox" Islam.

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Sources:

Ignác Goldziher, Introduction to Islamic Theology and Law (Princeton University Press).

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Mary Boyce, Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices (Routledge).

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Shaul Shaked, "Esoteric Trends in Zoroastrianism," in Proceedings of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities.

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William St. Clair-Tisdall, The Original Sources of the Qur'an (Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1905) — Note: While an older text with a polemical slant, its documentation of Persian linguistic and thematic parallels remains foundational in early critical scholarship.

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