Classical Syriac is written in the Syriac alphabet, a derivation of the Aramaic alphabet. The language is preserved in a large body of Syriac literature, that comprises roughly 90% of the extant Aramaic literature. Along with Greek and Latin, Syriac became one of the three most important languages of Early Christianity. Already from the first and second centuries AD, the inhabitants of the region of Osroene began to embrace Christianity, and by the third and fourth centuries, local Edessan Aramaic language became the vehicle of the specific Christian culture that came to be known as the Syriac Christianity. Because of theological differences, Syriac-speaking Christians diverged during the 5th century into the Church of the East that followed the East Syriac Rite under the Persian rule, and the Syriac Orthodox Church that followed the West Syriac Rite under the Byzantine rule.
As a liturgical language of Syriac Christianity, Classical Syriac language spread throughout Asia as far as the South Indian Malabar Coast, and Eastern China, and became the medium of communication and cultural dissemination for the later Arabs, and (to a lesser extent) the other peoples of Parthian and Sasanian empires. Primarily a Christian medium of expression, Syriac had a fundamental cultural and literary influence on the development of Arabic, which largely replaced it during the later medieval period.
An excerpt from, "Syriac Source-Material For Islam’s Holy Book" By Mason Scott, October 18, 2019:
Note: Mohammed of Mecca, considered the “Seal of the Prophets” in Islam, is denoted “MoM”. Classical Arabic is denoted “CA”.)
A full understanding of the development of the Koran–and of the Mohammedan Faith in general–cannot be procured until one recognizes the percolating memetic environs in which it occurred. During the epoch of the religion’s gestation (from the late 7th century through the early 9th century), cultures of the Middle East were suffused with a potpourri of Abrahamic folklore. This is made apparent by the Syriac basis for much of what eventually came to be Islam’s sacred scripture. Here, I will assay the history of the CONTENT; while the next essay will be a linguistic analysis.
. . .To recapitulate: Islamic lore exhibits a plethora of signature traits of preceding Syriac texts. Questions arise. How? Why? Are we to suppose that this is some uncanny coincidence? Of course, Islamic apologists earnestly hope everyone will simply ignore the fact that both the Koran and Hadith are festooned with a plethora of thematic coinkydinks that were unique to Syriac sources. For they realize that acknowledging this would entail conceding the derivative nature of their creed. Far from a verbatim transcript from the Creator of the Universe, Mohammedan theology is a bespoke concatenation of rehashed Syriac lore that proliferated in the Middle East at the time.
We might consider, again, the environs in which the authors of the Koran would have lived. In Yathrib, there were three major Jewish tribes (the Banu Kuraydha, Banu Nadhir, and Banu Kaynuka), each of which would have spoken Syriac. Other Jewish settlements in the vicinity could be found at Khaybar and on the Gulf of Akaba (at the site of the ancient city of Elat[h], known as “Aila” to the Romans). {A} All of them would have been circulating the sort of Abrahamic lore with which MoM and his contemporaries would have been familiar. Notably, this did NOT include the Book of Revelation, which was never accepted by the Syriac Church. It should therefore come as little surprise that THAT book’s zany prognostications do not play a role in Mohammedan eschatology.
This is quite telling; as this material—so prominent in Nicene Christianity—is absent even though there turned out to be an OBSESSION with Judgement Day in the “Recitations”. If one were looking for cosmic mayhem, the Book of Revelation would have been the first place to look. This is especially striking when we consider that Jesus Christ ALSO makes a re-appearance in Islam’s apocalyptic set-piece—further incentive to riff off of the anti-Roman author, John of Patmos.
Meanwhile, the perception of JoN as merely a prophet (i.e. a mortal man; a position known as “adoptionism”) would have been well-established in Arab circles. Notably, Paul of Samosata, who served as bishop of Antioch in the 3rd century, had preached a form of adoptionism known as “monarchianism”—which would later inspire Arianism. As it so happened, Paul maintained a close relationship with the Arab queen of Palmyra, Bat-Zabbai (a.k.a. “Zenobia”), who would have spoken a dialect of Syriac. And, as it also happened, the catechetical school at Antioch was a hub for Nestorianism (the branch of Syriac Christianity best known for adoptionism). MoM and his contemporaries would have been well-acquainted with the (Syriac) arguments for the adoptionist view of JoN…which would become the MOHAMMEDAN view of JoN. Koran 4:171 could have just as well been written by an Arian or Nestorian. (For more on the relation between the Nazarenes and early Islam, see Joachim Gnilka’s “Die Nazarener Und Der Koran: Eine Spurensuche”.)
Another point worth considering. Had the material really been “sent down” from heaven (as the Koran insists it was), there would certainly have been something in it that wasn’t already circulating amongst the people of the region–something novel and erudite (that is: something could not be explained by what was already available by the 7th century). Or there would have been some tid-bit of insight that could not possibly have been known by mere mortals at the time.
No such tid-bit exists.
Verses 4-6 in Surah 25 and verse 15 of Surah 68 give the game away–as they openly admit that contemporaneous skeptics pointed out that people were already familiar with what was being propounded. (They considered the “Recitations” a re-hashing of “the tales of our forefathers”.) In other words: “None of this is anything new; we’ve heard all of it before.” How, then, are we to suppose MoM got these ideas? The Koran actually tells us in verses 103-105 of Surah 16. It was not a revelation from god; it was regurgitated folklore.
. . .So to truly understand the embryonic stage of Islam, it is important to recognize that the Mohammedan movement began as a REVIVALIST movement. This is simply to say that it was an endeavor to bring people back to a Faith that had existed all along—from Noah, through Abraham and Moses and Solomon, to Jesus of Nazareth. In the process, exponents sought to validate the Arabs’ Ishmaelite pedigree; as they (understandably) felt they’d been relegated to the margins of Abrahamic lore. While refuting the Trinitarian model of Nicene Christianity was the central theological aim, buoying the pride of Arabs fed into to their (rejuvenated) ethnic identity.
. . .Again, the question arises: Why is there such vociferous—even militant—push-back when it is pointed out that the Mohammedan movement began as a SYRIAC movement? Infelicitously, there is a grave vulnerability built into Islamic doctrine. Recall that the story is that the Koran was a VERBATIM TRANSCRIPT of god’s speech…down to every last phoneme. Such a brazen claim sets the entire dogmatic edifice up for a fatal fall. For the moment we find that the “Recitations” were NOT delivered in unadulterated CA, the entire house of cards collapses.
And so it goes: In its attempt to bolster its sacrosanctity, the creed paints itself into a corner. In order for the standard Islamic narrative to hold up, the final revelation HAD to be delivered in CA. It couldn’t be otherwise. This position cannot be abandoned, lest the credence of virtually everything else is brought into serious question. Consequently, this is a hill that obdurate Muslim apologists will inclined to die on.
In sum: The Achilles Heal of Islam is its Syriac provenance.
. . .{18 John Wansbrough concurs that the Syriac version of Abrahamic lore suffused Hijazi culture during the time of MoM…and even into the 8th century, when the “Recitations” were still being curated. (Bear in mind that the first CA dictionary, the “Kitab al-Ayn”, had only just been compiled at the end of the 8th century.) Wansbrough goes a step further, though, proposing that Syriac material saturated the Middle East to the degree that it trumped any influence that the indigenous (Arabian) pagan theology may have had on the gestating Mohammedan movement. Wansbrough therefore conjectures that the character of MoM himself (qua “Rasul Allah”) may have been a post-hoc fabrication, an Ishmaelite patriarch contrived so as to rationalize the emergence of a newfangled Abrahamic Faith–imbuing the movement with a distinctly Ishmaelite (i.e. Arabian) pedigree.}
Video Title: Ep.18: Can we know that the Qur'an was changed to Arabic? Source: PfanderFilms. Date Published: November 3, 2022. Description:
It seems odd that God (that would be Allah, according to the Muslims) would choose to reveal his "final and greatest revelation" in a language which could not even accommodate his revelation textually. So, why would he choose Arabic, since it was so crude and as yet un-voweled and un-dotted, therefore unable to be read properly?
The answer can be found within the pages of the Qur'an itself. When one looks at certain passages, it becomes clear that the Qur'an was created as a political tool to give the Arabic speaking people their own revelation in contradistinction to the other competing empire, the Byzantine Christian Empire, whose religious language was Aramaic, and whose revelation included the Old and New Testaments.
We now come to our concluding episode concerning the Proto-Qur'an, where Jay tries to make sense of where the Qur'an came from, and how it became the Qur'an we have today. Normally this would take hours to do, but all he has is about 20 minutes...so here goes...
