Islam, the second largest religious group in the world next to Christianity is now in controversy after the discovery of the oldest fragments of Koran which contradict the claims of the religious text. British scholars suggest that the fragments discovered last month predate the accepted founding date of the Muslim prophet Mohammed.
The four ancient pages dispute the Islamic teachings about the religious group's famous icon Muhammad. With the help of carbon dating, the fragments which were hidden away in a Birmingham library were found to be 1,370 years old. The date makes them the oldest Koran pages in the world.
The result given by carbon dating can potentially throw Islam into disarray since the pages existed even before the lifetime of the Prophet. The Muslims believe that the contents of the Koran is the revelation of God shown to Mohammed. How can God reveal His Words to someone who has not yet existed?
Mohammed which is known by Muslims as The Prophet is believed to have lived from 570 A.D. to 632 A.D. and founded Islam after 610 A.D. Contrary to this, radiocarbon dating says that the fragments were made between the period of 568 A.D. and 645 A.D. This can be a big problem to the Muslims since the discovered pages exist before Islam.
Dr. Keith Small from the University of Oxford gave his opinion about the issue. He said that, "This gives more ground to what have been peripheral views of the Koran's genesis, like that Muhammad and his early followers used a text that was already in existence and shaped it to fit their own political and theological agenda, rather than Muhammad receiving a revelation from heaven."
According to the scholars, the fragments suggest that an early fully-formed Koran was already present earlier than the sixth century. But the Islamic scholars did not let the issue slip on their hands. They claim that the fragments only add up to the traditional accounts of the scripture. The first formal text of Koran was not created until 653 A.D but the teachings of the group circulated through oral tradition which can explain the discovered artefacts.
