72 Virgins or 72 Raisins???, page 1
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Topic started on 10-6-2006 @ 04:48 PM by ShadowXIX
Its seems some scholars now think the fate of Martyrs as told in the Koran is not 72 virgins but rather 72 white grapes or white raisins thanks to a mistranslation from Aramaic.



Christoph Luxenberg's book, Die Syro-Aramaische Lesart des Koran, available only in German, came out just over a year ago, but has already had an enthusiastic reception, particularly among those scholars with a knowledge of several Semitic languages at Princeton, Yale, Berlin, Potsdam, Erlangen, Aix-en-Provence, and the Oriental Institute in Beirut.

Luxenberg tries to show that many obscurities of the Koran disappear if we read certain words as being Syriac and not Arabic. We cannot go into the technical details of his methodology but it allows Luxenberg, to the probable horror of all Muslim males dreaming of sexual bliss in the Muslim hereafter, to conjure away the wide-eyed houris promised to the faithful in suras XLIV.54; LII.20, LV.72, and LVI.22. Luxenberg 's new analysis, leaning on the Hymns of Ephrem the Syrian, yields "white raisins" of "crystal clarity" rather than doe-eyed, and ever willing virgins - the houris. Luxenberg claims that the context makes it clear that it is food and drink that is being offerred, and not unsullied maidens or houris.




Man if that turns out to be true thats one heck of a ironic bummer waiting for some "Martyrs". I know there are likely many mistranslations in the Bible as well as the Koran but I havent been able to find a English copy of Christoph Luxenberg's book yet to look more into his case for this particular mistranslation.


www.guardian.co.uk...

syrcom.cua.edu...


reply posted on 11-6-2006 @ 09:24 PM by Nygdan
I think that the main thesis of this guy's work is a lot more startling than the subsitution of divine virgins for grapes. That the quaran and associated texts are better understood as being written in Syriac than Arabic.

syrcom.cua.edu...

Luxenberg summarizes the cultural and linguistic importance of written Syriac for the Arabs and for the Qur’ān. At the time of Muhammad, Arabic was not a written language. Syro-Aramaic or Syriac was the language of written communication in the Near East from the second to the seventh centuries A.D. [...]Part of Luxenberg’s study shows that Syriac influence on those who created written Arabic was transmitted through a Christian medium, the influence of which was fundamental.



reply posted on 11-6-2006 @ 09:34 PM by Spiderj
Nice find shadow!

I really hope this turns out to be correct and gets a lot of publicity because I think you're going to have a hard time finding suicide bombers by promising them a box of these when they die:

www.sun-maid.com...

"And if you die as a martyr you will recieve 72 dkklfjgoei in the afterlife"

"What was that? What do I get?"

"72 rchems"

"Did you just say you want me to blow myself and a schoolbus up for 72 raisins? Yeah, I think I'm going to move to India and do tech support, see ya."

"But they're very good raisins...hello...72 rais...do they have a mathcing 401k at that tech support place, hey wait up."

Spiderj



reply posted on 16-6-2006 @ 09:43 AM by redbullion01
Originally posted by ShadowXIX
Is there anything close to a equivalent in Christianity of the Hadith? Are we talking about something like the Book of Enoch for Christians, or is it more of a New Testament for the Quran.

No, Hadiths are definitley not considered a New Testament type text. The Qu'ran and the Hadiths go hand in hand with each other and are considered by the majority of Sunni Muslims to be canonical. As I have stated elsewhere, the Qu'ran comes first in matters of authority, and where the Qu'ran does not specify certain commands or doesn't explain in detail what a Believer must do, then the Hadiths take over in Authority. An example of this is in Salat (prayer), the Qu'ran tells us to pray to God but not how to pray or how many repetitions of prayer per day and so on. The answers to this come in the Hadith or Sunnah (The Prophet's example). Many other things lay in the Hadiths like Islamic end-times prophecy and anecdotes of wisdom and so forth. Sadly, some Muslims follow only those Hadith which they wish to follow, which unsuprisingly accounts for the many different sects in Islam.


Forgive my ignorance on this subject.. I just want to get a better understanding of how important some Muslims consider the text of the Hadith.

I am nowhere near an expert on the subject of Hadiths, some Islamic scholars devote their entire lives to study of them and some to Qu'ranic exegesis. But, as I understand there are different classifications of Hadiths, from which there are thousands, that assign qualities to each of them. Sahih(Authentic), Sunan(Good? or Suspcious?) and another which I can't remember the name but it's considered a weak class. Even as such, scholars routinely scrutinize and authenticate Hadith, which are narrated by chains of other people. If even one narrator in a chain is considered an unreliable source then their quality is diminished.

From what I understand, Hadiths were compiled by early scholars like Imam Hanafi and Imam Shafi'. Which in turn were compiled by the Sahabah(R.A) or companions of Prophet Muhammad (Saw). The Sahabah were largely illiterate and took to memorizing the sayings of the Prophet (saw) as was customary back then with Arabs who would memorize entire poems.

A couple good sites on Hadith here and here. As with all things textual, you have to not only look at its literal meaning but also the wisdom in the words. Hope that helps.

geek101 - "lets make fun of hadith".
If thats what you wish then go ahead. Just know that there some Muslims out there that still follow the Qu'ran and Hadiths.
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