Why the Quran Was Revealed in Arabic

Suppose we ask our Muslim friends why Allah revealed the Quran in Arabic. Simple question, right? Here they'll say something like, "Because Arabic is such a rich language" or "because Arabic is the perfect language for Allah to express His eloquence."

Unfortunately for our Muslim friends, the Quran tells us exactly why Allah revealed the Quran in Arabic. Allah's reasons for revealing the Quran in Arabic completely contradict what Muslims today believe about the Quran. This is why Muslim scholars never discuss what we're about to discuss; they don't want anyone to know what you're about to know. If you think I'm exaggerating, watch this until the end and explain to me how this information isn't utterly devastating to dawa.

Let's set the stage for the problem by recalling how these discussions about the Quran arise. Our Muslim friends invite us to convert to Islam, and we ask, "Why should we convert to Islam?" They say, "Because it's the truth." We reply, "But lots of ideologies claim to be the truth. Why should we believe that Islam is the truth?" They say, "Because of the Quran; it's so masterfully written it must be the word of God."

Now, even before we open the Quran and start reading, we can spot an obvious difficulty with this wonderfully written argument. Romeo and Juliet was wonderfully written. The Brothers Karamazov was wonderfully written. The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock was wonderfully written. What in the name of common sense does all this wonderful writing have to do with whether these works are the word of God? As far as I can tell, absolutely nothing.

But we're trying to be nice, so in spite of the absurdity of the claim, we open the Quran anyway. We find the worst, most boring, most disorganized book we've ever read in our entire lives—terrible beyond our already low expectations. So we go back to our Muslim friends and tell them, as politely as we can, that the Quran is less interesting, less impressive, and less enlightening than a phone book.

And that's when our Muslim friends pull the ultimate trump card from the bottom of the desperation deck. They say, "Well, it only works in Arabic." Here we start wondering, if Islam is the religion for all people, why would the main evidence for Islam only work in one language—a language that most people do not speak? Even native Arabic speakers can't understand much of the Quran because it's written in classical Arabic. But it gets worse.

Even classical Arabic scholars can't understand parts of the Quran. The Arabic scholar Gett Pu, for instance, says this: "The Quran claims for itself that it is mubin or clear, but if you look at it, you will notice that every fifth sentence or so simply doesn't make sense." Many Muslims and orientalists will tell you otherwise, of course, but the fact is that a fifth of the Quranic text is just incomprehensible.

This is what has caused the traditional anxiety regarding translation. If the Quran is not comprehensible, if it can't even be understood in Arabic, then it's not translatable. People fear that. And since the Quran claims repeatedly to be clear but obviously is not, as even speakers of Arabic will tell you, there is a contradiction.

The Iranian scholar Ali Dashi, in his book "23 Years," adds: "The Quran contains sentences which are incomplete and not fully intelligible without the aid of commentaries; foreign words, unfamiliar Arabic words, and words used with other than the normal meaning; adjectives and verbs inflected without observance of the concords of gender and number; illogically and ungrammatically applied pronouns, which sometimes have no reference; and predicates that, in rhymed passages, are often remote from the subjects."

These and other such aberrations in the language have given scope to critics who deny the Quran's eloquence. So we're supposed to believe that the Quran is from God because of its clarity and eloquence when experts tell us that it's hopelessly unclear and not very good at all.

This is where our Muslim friends jump in and tell us, "Don't trust the experts; trust the dawa guys who say that the Quran is the most amazing book ever." Yes, the dawa guys—those honest and dependable Boy Scouts who assured us that the Quran has been perfectly preserved but later admitted that it was all a lie; the dawa guys—those upright and credible do-gooders who assured us that the Quran is filled with miraculous scientific insights but later admitted that it was all a lie; the dawa guys—those compulsive liars who assure us that the Quran is supernaturally eloquent and must be from God. And we just have to believe them. We just have to take their word for it.

Notice we're supposed to convert to Islam because of the supernatural eloquence of the Quran. But how are we supposed to know that the Quran is supernaturally eloquent when we don't speak Arabic? What our Muslim friends are really telling us is this: We either need to trust what the dawa guys say about the Quran without understanding the evidence for ourselves, or we need to spend years studying classical Arabic so that we can perhaps find the evidence for ourselves someday. So we can either accept what the dawa guys say about their book without investigating, or we can spend years learning another language so that we can eventually investigate the matter on our own.

Why is this a problem? It's a problem because it completely contradicts the Quran, and you're about to see how. Here goes. According to the Quran, Allah has sent prophets to every nation. In Surah 16:36 of the Quran, Allah says, "And verily we have raised in every nation a messenger proclaiming, 'Serve Allah and shun false gods.'" Don't forget what Allah says here: a messenger (a rasool) was sent to every nation to guide people. Similarly, in Surah 10:47 we read, "And for every nation there is a messenger. And when their messenger cometh on the Day of Judgment, it will be judged between them fairly, and they will not be wronged."

So Allah sent a messenger to every nation, but the Arabs were the last to receive guidance, which is why Muhammad was the last of the messengers. How do we know Muhammad was last? Let's find out. In Surah 36:2-6, Allah declares, "I swear by the Quran full of wisdom, most surely you, Muhammad, are one of the apostles on a right way, a revelation of the Mighty, the merciful that you may warn a people whose fathers were not warned, so they are heedless." Do the math here: a messenger had been sent to every nation, but the people of Arabia hadn't been warned.

We'll go ahead and ignore the fact that according to the Quran, Abraham and Ishmael were in Mecca, where they built the Kaaba. I guess they just kept quiet while they were in Arabia constructing a house of worship—no warner to the people of Arabia before Muhammad—but every other nation had its messenger. Surah 34:43-44 states, "And when our clear communications are recited to them, they say, 'This is not but a man who desires to turn you away from that which your fathers worshiped,' and they say, 'This is not but a lie that is forged.' And those who disbelieve say of the truth when it comes to them, 'This is only clear enchantment.' And we have not given them any books which they read, nor did we send to them before you, Muhammad, a warner." No warner before Muhammad—sorry, Abraham and Ishmael.

Surah 32:3: "Or do they say, 'He has forged it'? Nay, it is the truth from your Lord that you, Muhammad, may warn a people to whom no warner has come before you, that they may follow the right direction."

So a messenger had been sent to every nation, but no messenger had come to the Arabs, and this is why Allah sent Muhammad. Once Muhammad had been sent to the Arabs—the last people to get their messenger—every nation had been warned, as we read in Surah 35:24: "Surely we have sent you, Muhammad, with the truth as a bearer of good news and a warner, and there is not a people but a warner has gone among them."

According to the Quran, Muhammad was sent to warn his people, the Arabs. Other groups had their own warners, and the Quran is clear that when Allah sends a messenger to a group, He sends a messenger who speaks the language of that group. Surah 14:4: "And we sent not a messenger except with the language of his people in order that he might make the message clear for them." So that's why Abraham and Ishmael didn't warn the people of Mecca: wrong language.

Here's where you should start to see a problem for the Muslim view of Muhammad. If Allah only sends a messenger who speaks the language of the group he's sent to, how can Muhammad be the messenger for the entire world? Did Muhammad speak English, Russian, Spanish, Mandarin, and Swahili? No. Then according to Allah, he's not the messenger for people who speak English or Russian or Spanish or Mandarin or Swahili.

Allah specifically says in Surah 42:7 that the Quran was revealed in Arabic to warn the Arabs who lived in and around Mecca. "And thus have We revealed to you, Muhammad, an Arabic Quran that you may warn the mother city (Mecca) and those around it, and that you may give warning of the Day of gathering together wherein is no doubt; a party shall be in the garden and another party in the burning fire." It's an Arabic revelation for people who speak Arabic.

Surah 44:58: "Verily we have made this Quran easy in thy tongue, in order that they may give heed." Allah made the Quran easy for who? People who speak Italian? No, in thy tongue, in your language. Why? In your language, that they may give heed—they who? Arabic speakers.

Surah 43:2-4: "By the book that makes things clear, we have made it a Quran in Arabic that you may be able to understand and learn wisdom, and verily it is in the mother of the book in our presence, high in dignity, full of wisdom." Allah made the Quran in Arabic so that people who speak Arabic can understand it. If you don't speak Arabic, it's not for you.

Surah 26:192-196: "And most surely this is a revelation from The Lord of the worlds; the faithful Spirit has descended with it upon your heart that you, Muhammad, may be of the warners in plain Arabic language. And most surely the same is in the scriptures of the ancients." Muhammad was one of many warners; he's the warner in plain Arabic language, but he brought the same message that's in the scriptures brought by other warners in other languages.

Surah 41:2-3: "A revelation from Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful; a book whereof The verses are explained in detail, a Quran in Arabic for people who know." Think about this for a moment: Allah says He revealed the Quran in Arabic so that Muhammad could warn the people in and around Mecca. He revealed the Quran in Arabic to warn Arabs.

But why did the Arabs need a revelation in Arabic? There were Jews and Christians in Arabia, and according to the Quran, Jews and Christians had reliable scripture from God. The Arabs could have simply listened to what Jews and Christians were saying about their books. So why did the Arabs need a book in their own language?

Muslims today will say, "Because the scriptures of the Jews and Christians were corrupted." Here again, that's not what the Quran says. The Quran affirms the inspiration, preservation, and authority of the scriptures of the Jews and Christians. The Quran, according to Allah, confirms previous scriptures in Arabic. Surah 46:12: "And before this Quran was the book of Moses as a guide and a mercy, and this book (the Quran) confirms it in the Arabic tongue to admonish the unjust and as glad tidings to those who do right."

The Quran confirms previous scriptures in the Arabic language so that Arabs will know that these books are the word of Allah. See how this works? If you were a 7th-century Arab and you saw Jews claiming that they had a book from God, how would you know whether to believe them? You don't understand Hebrew. How would you know if their book is from God? You would know because Allah gave you a book in your language that confirms the books in other languages.

According to the Quran, it makes absolutely no sense for Allah to reveal a book to a group of people unless that book is revealed in a language that the people understand. Surah 41:44: "And if we had sent this as a Quran in a foreign language other than Arabic, they would have said, 'Why are not its verses explained in detail in our language?'"

What a book not in Arabic, and the messenger is an Arab. According to the Quran, if Allah hadn't given a revelation in Arabic, the Arabs would have had an excuse for not obeying Allah.

Surah 6:155-157: "And this Quran is a book we have revealed, blessed; therefore follow it and guard against evil that Mercy may be shown to you, lest you say that the book was only revealed to two parties before us, and we were truly unaware of what they read. Or lest you should say, 'If the book had been revealed to us, we would certainly have been better guided than they.'"

If a book isn't revealed in your language, you're just not responsible for following the book. So did Allah reveal the Quran because all other revelations had been corrupted? No, that's a Muslim myth. Allah revealed the Quran so that Arabs wouldn't be able to complain that they didn't have an inspired book in their own language.

The position of the Quran then goes something like this: Allah sent messengers to every nation, and He inspired scriptures for different groups of people. These scriptures are reliable and authoritative for the groups they were revealed to. As of the early 7th century, Arabs didn't have a revelation in their own language, but these Arabs couldn't simply trust what Jews and Christians were saying about the Torah and the Gospel. How would Arabs know if Jews and Christians were telling the truth? So Arabs needed a revelation in Arabic; that's why Allah sent Muhammad.

Now that Arabs have the Quran, they can read the Quran. Other groups have their own books in their own languages. This is why Allah, in the Quran, orders Jews and Christians to follow their own scriptures, not the Quran. In Surah 5:43, some Jews come to Muhammad to settle a dispute. How does Allah respond? "How come they unto thee, Muhammad, for judgment when they have the Torah wherein Allah hath delivered judgment for them?" Notice what Allah says: "Muhammad, why are Jews coming to you when they have their own book? They don't need you. You're the messenger to the Arabs, not to the Jews."

Surah 5:68: "Say, O People of the Book (Jews and Christians), ye have no ground to stand upon unless you stand fast by the law, the Gospel, and all the Revelation that has come to you from your Lord." Jews and Christians are supposed to follow the revelations that came to them. They're supposed to believe in Muhammad; they're supposed to believe in all of the messengers, but they're supposed to live by and judge by the revelations brought to them by their messengers. Allah sent a messenger to every nation; people are responsible for obeying the messenger who was sent to them, speaking their language.

That's the position of the Quran. Why is it a problem for Muslims? Well, here goes. Our Muslim friends tell us that the Quran is the book for all people and that the Quran can only be understood in Arabic. But the point of revealing the Quran in Arabic, according to the Quran itself, was for people to have a book in their own language so that they wouldn't have to learn another language to understand the word of Allah.

The Quran was revealed in Arabic so that a particular group of people—the Arabs in and around Mecca—would have a revelation in their own language so that they could understand it for themselves. According to the Quran, if Arabs didn't have a revelation in their own language, they'd have an excuse on Judgment Day. They'd be able to say, "Allah, you can't blame us for not obeying you; you never told us what to do in a language we could understand."

Allah didn't want them to have an excuse, so He sent them a revelation they could understand in the language they spoke. So we've read the passages. Allah Himself says, "How can I make this any clearer? I'm giving Arabs a book in their language because they can't just trust what Jews and Christians are saying about their books. And I can't expect Arabs to spend years learning Hebrew or Greek so that they can examine the Torah and the Gospel for themselves. People need a revelation in their own language, and if they don't have one, they'll have a legitimate excuse on Judgment Day.

I can't allow that, so I'm revealing the Quran in Arabic for Arabs," that's what Allah says. But what do our Muslim friends tell us? What do the dawa guys tell us? They tell us that we all need to live by and judge by the Quran, a book revealed in a language we don't speak and don't understand. They tell us that we either have to just believe what they say about the Quran or we have to spend years learning a language we don't speak.

This is the exact opposite of what Allah says about why He revealed the Quran. This is precisely what Allah says He was trying to avoid. Allah says that He sent messengers to different groups in different languages so that people could understand His commands in their own languages. Muslims tell us the exact opposite; they tell us that we all have to obey a book in a language we don't understand.

If you read the Muslim sources, you'll find over and over again that our Muslim friends completely contradict their own God, their own prophet, and their own book. Why? Because they have to. Allah told them that He sent messengers to every nation and that each group had to judge by the revelations in their language. But Muslims eventually checked the books of other groups and realized that they didn't line up with Islam.

The obvious conclusion to draw was that Allah and Muhammad had no clue what they were talking about. But Muslims couldn't say that because that would make them apostates, and you know what happens to apostates in Islam. So they started lying. They said, "Oh, contrary to what Allah clearly says in the Quran, all other scriptures have been corrupted, and everyone now has to judge by the Quran"—the book Allah says He revealed so that people wouldn't have to follow a book in a language they don't understand.

Once they started lying, they couldn't stop, which is why they lied about perfect preservation and scientific miracles, and Muhammad in the Song of Solomon, and it's a religion of peace, and Muhammad was a feminist, and Aisha was actually 18, and so on. Dawa is deception; there is no plan B.

The weird part is that the dawa guys psychologically condition their followers to only listen to them and not to listen to Allah and Muhammad. If you don't believe me, here's an experiment you can perform: Go to your Muslim friends and show them what Allah says about why the Quran was revealed in Arabic.

Your Muslim friends won't care even slightly; they'll just go to their favorite dawa guy who will tell them, "No, the Quran is the book for all people in all languages, and all other books have been corrupted," and your Muslim friends will believe their favorite dawa guy even when he contradicts Allah.

Islam isn't the religion of submission to Allah; it's the religion of submission to compulsive liars. If you'd like another example of the dawa guys saying the exact opposite of what their God and their prophet say, be sure to watch my video "What the Quran Really Says About the Gospel," where I go through every single verse in the Quran that so much as mentions the Gospel, but somehow can't manage to find a word—not one word—about the Gospel being corrupted.

Strange how the dawa guys expect us to take their book seriously when they obviously don't take their own book seriously.