Many
Versions Of Koran
After
Muhammads death, at the time of caliph Abu-Bakr, ,many of those who
had memorized the Koran died while fighting the apostates in the
battle of " Alyamama, "Omar feared that the death of those men would
result in the loss of a great portion of the Koran and suggested to
Abu-Bakr that the Koran should be collected in one volume.
Abu-Bakr was reluctant to do that, because Muhammad did not collect
the Koran in one volume during his life. After much discussion
Omar persuaded Abu-Bakr to order the collection of the Koran.
Abu-Bark ordered Aid Bin Sabot to do the job (Al-Mush Al-Shareef,
page 59,60).
By Allah! If they had
ordered me to shift one of the mountains, it would not have been
heavier for me than this ordering me to collect the Koran.
Zaid Ibn Sabit said. Then I said to Abu-Bakr, " How will you
do something which Allah's Apostle did not do?"
Abu-Bakr said " By Allah, it is a good thing"
(Sahih-al-Bukhari, Part 6, page
477).
Therefore
Zaid Ibn Sabit agreed to collect the various pieces of the Koran.
However, when Islam became the religion of many countries, every
country used the version of the Koran which was known among them:
the Syrians read AbiKaabs version, the people of Kofa read Abdallah
Ibn Massouds version, others read Abu Moussa Alashabys version and
so on.
When Caliph Uthman
took the caliphate, he was confronted by such confusion and sedition
concerning the reading of the Koran in the different Islamic
countries that he ordered it to be rewritten.
Uthaman
ordered Zaid Ibn Sabit and three other men form Quraysh, Abdullah
Ibn Al-Zubeer, Saeed Ibn El-Uss, and Abdelrahman Ibn Al-Harith Ibn
Hesham, to rewrite the Koran. It was Uthmans order to the
scribes " If you disagree with Zaid Ibn Sabit in anything of
the Koran, write it in the language of Quraysh, because the Koran
was revealed in the language of Quraysh." They did
(Al-Mushaf Al-Shareef, Pages
66,70).
After Uthman competed his Koran he forced all
the Islamic countries to have one Koran - and banned all other
codices. He finished the matter by burning all other codices
of the Koran.
In fact
there is a claim that this manuscript, held by the Muslim Board of
Uzbekistan, is
the earliest existent written version of the Koran. It is the
definitive version, known as the Mushaf of Othman, superseding all
other versions. The third Caliph Othman, who ordered its
compilation, was assassinated while reading it.
Koran according to
Encyclopedia Encarta
Qur'an
or Koran
Pronounced As:
koran, -rn
[Arab.,=reading, recitation], the sacred book of Islam. Revealed by
God to the Prophet
Muhammad
in separate revelations over the major portion of the Prophet's life
at Mecca and at Medina, the Qur'an was intended as a recited text,
and was not compiled as a single volume during the life of the
Prophet. The establishment of the canonical text is attributed to
the 3d caliph, Uthman, who appointed a committee (651-52) to
reconcile the conflicting versions then available, under the
direction of Zaid ibn Thabit, one of the Prophet's scribes.