btw obecah da cu napisati veceras o onoj gluposti o muhamedu i pijavicama, pa evo, poduzi je tekst, smrcak zadaj se
Much fuss is made by Muslims today about the supposed knowledge of “embryology” (the development of the embryo in the mother’s womb) in the Qur’an. They ask how Muhammad could possibly possess such knowledge, which, moreover, they believe is correct. This section argues that Muhammad could indeed possess such knowledge, which is actually incorrect, and — worse! — is stolen from (plagiarizes) the writings of Galen, a famous ancient Greek medical doctor.
First, let’s see what kind of “embryological” information is included in the Qur’an.
In verse 22:5, we read the following:
22:5 “O mankind! if ye are in doubt concerning the Resurrection, then lo! We have created you from dust, then from a drop of seed, then from a clot, then from a little lump of flesh shapely and shapeless, that We may make (it) clear for you. [...]”
A similar description unfolds in verses 23:12–14:
23:12 “Verily We created man from a product of wet earth;”
23:13 “Then placed him as a drop (of seed) in a safe lodging;”
23:14 “Then fashioned We the drop a clot, then fashioned We the clot a little lump, then fashioned We the little lump bones, then clothed the bones with flesh, and then produced it as another creation. So blessed be Allah, the Best of creators!”
The above verses are usually accompanied by the explanation that the Arabic word for “clot” is alaqa, which can also mean “a lump of blood”. This is brought as solid evidence of the deep Qur’anic knowledge on embryology, and the question asked is: “How could Muhammad possibly know all that?”
My suggestion to Muslims is that they should stop asking this question, because the answer could be very, very embarrassing.
Muhammad could know very well what is described in 22:5 and 23:12–14 (which is wrong anyway, as we’ll soon see), in two different ways:
First, by direct observation. (This is the most embarrassing possibility for Muslims.) The ancient Islamic texts (the ahadith) describe several instances of horrible brutality performed to people by Muhammad — not directly by his own hand, but indirectly, by his “right hand” (his faithful Muslim men). I have talked extensively about those atrocities that reveal Muhammad’s brutal nature here, here, and here, so I won’t repeat them in this article. I will only mention one such case, in which the victim was said to be a woman called Asma bint Marwan. She was a poet who wrote against Muhammad. In Muhammad’s code of ethics, if you insulted the self-proclaimed “Apostle of Allah” with words, you had to face the knife of one of his believers. Indeed, as described in ibn Ishaq:676, Asma bint Marwan was brutally murdered in her sleep by one of Muhammad’s religious zealots, while she had her five sons sleeping around her at home, one of them a baby suckling on her breast. Muhammad’s “right hand”, one by the name of Umayr, removed the baby from her breast and plunged his sword into her body. The next morning in the mosque, Muhammad, who was aware of the assassination, said: “You have helped Allah and His Apostle.” Umayr, obviously feeling remorse, said: “She had five sons; should I feel guilty?” “No,” Muhammad answered. “Killing her was as meaningless as two goats butting heads.” (!!!!!!)
Let it be noted that the above hadith is regarded by Muslim scholars as false, artificially concocted. But what is important for us is not whether the slaughtering of Asma bint Marwan really happened or not, but the very existence and preservation of this story among Muslims. That this story exists is absolutely true — if one doubts this, one only has to open the book of ibn Ishaq at paragraph 676 and read. Now, the existence of such stories implies that the Muslims of Muhammad’s times (and later) considered it absolutely normal and “just” to have a woman murdered in her sleep, being disemboweled in the presence of her children. And the judgment attributed to Muhammad (that such a murder is as meaningless as two goats butting heads), even if artificial and made-up, shows very clearly what the Bedouin Muslims considered “meaningful” and “morally justified”. So, one wonders how many times in their lives such people had witnessed the disemboweling of women so as to consider the above-described murder as totally normal, attributing it to their religious leader. If they thought that Muhammad thought that plunging a sword into a woman’s (and a mother’s!) body is “as meaningless as two goats butting heads”, then I don’t see why you, my dear Muslim, regard it as “hard to believe” that Muhammad had witnessed some murders of pregnant women, and thus knew very well what embryos look like.
However, the tragic and simultaneously ironic fact is that an embryo looks like a blood clot (alaqa) only when you remove it by force from the woman’s uterus. But in reality the klix embryo described in the 2nd stage of Qur’an’s verses 22:5 & 23:14 is not a bloody clot, but a collection of cells lacking blood, because its circulatory system hasn’t developed yet. The blood that Muhammad might have seen (if his men opened up some women’s bodies other than Asma bint Marwan’s) was the mother’s blood. This is a terrible error that Allah shouldn’t have made, if Allah was indeed speaking in 22:5 & 23:14.
The second possibility for Muhammad’s source of knowledge is not as embarrassing as the previous one, but is still embarrassing. Specifically, the above Qur’anic verses sound eerily similar to a passage written four centuries earlier by the Greek medical doctor Galen (Γαληνός). Galen’s text follows on the left, Qur’an’s verses 23:13–14 on the right (ancient texts taken from this web page), and below them is the translation of each:
Γαληνός (“De Semine”): Qur’an, sura 23
Πάλιν δ’ ἐπὶ τὴν πρώτην τοῦ ζῴου σύστασιν ἐπανάγωμεν τὸν λόγον· καὶ ὅπως γε ἡμῖν εὔτακτός τε ἅμα καὶ σαφὴς γίγνοιτο, διελώμεθα τέτταρσι χρόνοις τὴν σύμπασαν τῶν κυουμένων δημιουργίαν.
πρῶτος μέν, ἐν ᾧ κατὰ τὰς ἀμβλώσεις τε καὶ κατὰ τὰς ἀνατομὰς ἡ τοῦ σπέρματος ἰδέα κρατεῖ. κατὰ τοῦτον τον χρόνον οὐδ’ Ἱπποκράτης ὁ πάντα θαυμάσιος ἤδη που κύημα καλεῖ τὴν τοῦ ζῴου σύστασιν, ἀλλ’, ὡς ἀρτίως ἠκούσαμεν ἐπὶ τῆς ἑκταίας ἐκπεσούσης, ἔτι γονήν.
ἐπειδὰν δὲ πληρωθῇ μὲν τοῦ αἵματος, ἡ καρδία δὲ καὶ ὁ ἐγκέφαλος καὶ τὸ ἧπαρ ἀδιάρθρωτα μὲν ᾖ καὶ ἀμόρφωτα, πῆξιν δ’ ἤδη τινὰ καὶ μέγεθος ἀξιόλογον ἔχῃ, δεύτερος μὲν οὗτος ὁ χρόνος ἐστί, σαρκοειδὴς δὲ καὶ οὐκέτι γονοειδής ἐστιν ἡ ουσία τοῦ κυήματος. οὐκοῦν δὲ γονὴν ἔτι προσαγορεύοντα τον Ἱπποκράτην τοιαύτην ἰδέαν εὕροις ἄν, ἀλλ’, ὡς εἴρηται, κύημα.
τρίτος ἐπὶ τῷδε χρόνος, ἡνίκα, ὡς εἴρηται, τὰς μὲν τρεῖς ἀρχὰς ἔστιν ἰδεῖν ἐναργῶς, ὑπογραφὴν δέ τινα καὶ οἷον σκιαγραφίαν ἁπάντων τῶν ἄλλων μορίων. ἐναργεστέραν μὲν γὰρ ὄψει τὴν περὶ τὰς τρεῖς ἀρχὰς διάπλασιν, ἀμυδροτέραν δὲ τὴν τῶν κατὰ τὴν γαστέραν μορίων, καὶ πολὺ δὴ τούτων ἔτι τὴν κατὰ τὰ κῶλα. ταῦτα γὰρ ὕστερον, ὡς Ἱπποκράτης ὠνόμαζεν, ὀζοῦται, τὴν πρὸς τοὺς κλάδους ἀναλογίαν ἐνδεικνύμενος τῇ προσηγορίᾳ.
τέταρτος δ’ οὗτός ἐστι καὶ τελευταῖος χρόνος, ἡνίκα ἤδη τά τ’ ἐν τοῖς κώλοις ἅπαντα διήρθρωται, καὶ οὐδ’ ἔμβρυον ἔτι μόνον, ἀλλ’ ἤδη καὶ παιδίον ὀνομάζει το κυούμενον ὁ θαυμάσιος Ἱπποκράτης, ὅτε καὶ ἀσκαρίζειν καὶ κινεῖσθαί φησιν, ὡς ζῴον ἤδη τέλειον.
Galen (translation: author) Author of the Qur’an (transl.: Pickthal):
But let us talk again about the beginning of the formation of the living being; and so as to make the account both orderly and clear, we will divide the whole creation of the fetuses into four stages.
The first stage is when, as seen in abortions and dissections, the form of the sperm [semen] prevails. At that stage, not even Hippocrates, the all-wonderful, does call the constitution of the living being a fetus, but, as we recently heard in the case of abortion on the sixth day, [he] still [calls it] semen.
But when it is filled with blood, the heart and the brain and the liver are still unarticulated and unformed, yet they have some solidity and considerable size; that is the second stage, during which the substance of the fetus is flesh-like and no more semen-like. Hence, you will not find Hippocrates calling the form “semen” anymore, but, as mentioned, a “fetus”.
The third stage follows those, as was said, when it is possible to see the three main parts clearly, a kind of outline, and some sort of silhouette of all the other parts. You will see the formation of the three ruling parts clearly, that of the parts of the belly more dimly, and even more [dimly] than those [you will see the formation] of the limbs. For, later those form “twigs”, as Hippocrates called them, wanting to show their resemblance to branches.
And the fourth and final stage is when all the parts of the limbs have been articulated, and the wonderful Hippocrates calls the fetus not just an embryo anymore, but already a child, when he says it jerks and moves, like a being already fully formed.
13. Then placed him as a drop (of seed) in a safe lodging;
14. Then fashioned We the drop a clot,
then fashioned We the clot a little lump,
then fashioned We the little lump bones,
then clothed the bones with flesh,
and then produced it as another creation.
So blessed be Allah, the Best of creators!
What I see is that both accounts divide the process of fetus formation into four stages. Qur’an’s stages are: (1) drop of seed (“nutfah”), (2) blood clot (“alaqa”), (3) little lump of flesh (“mudghah”), and (4) bones clothed with flesh (“another creation”). Galen’s stages are: (1) sperm form, (2) flesh-like with blood, (3) three main parts and a silhouette of the other parts, and (4) limbs (with bones) articulated, a fully formed child. There is another account of the “four stages” theory, given in verse 40:67 as follows: “He it is Who created you (1) from dust, then (2) from a drop (of seed) then (3) from a clot, then (4) bringeth you forth as a child,” Though the stages here differ, they remain four stages.
If two students of mine had given me the above texts in their exams, I would charge the one on the right for plagiarism and give him a big round zero (0) as a grade. His text sounds like a badly conceived summary, a caricature of the text on the left, which is more detailed, well thought-out, and well written. The author of the text on the left makes several references to his source (Hippocrates), which he names — as every scientific text should do — and even praises. In contrast, the author of the text on the right praises only himself (“So blessed be Allah, the Best of creators!”). What an immoral(*) show of bombastic arrogance! And what an enormous distance from what scientists today consider as morally correct scientific ethos!
Muslims make a lot of fuss about a certain medical doctor, Keith Moore, who, having been paid in the 1980’s by the Saudis in order to accept a position in an Arabic institution, claimed that modern embryology agrees with the four stages described in the Qur’an. Muslims speak of Moore as if he is the only scientist whose opinion matters. Never mind that there are thousands of other embryologists in the world, and that Moore himself rejected his early Islam-friendly opinions in a more recent book of his (after he returned to the West and stopped being paid in petro-dollars). What Muslims do not understand is that Moore’s earlier opinion did not support the Qur’an, but Galen, the ancient Greek doctor, who is the true author and originator of the idea of a four-stage embryonic development.
Interestingly, however, both Galen and — of course — the Qur’anic text that plagiarizes him are wrong regarding the first stage of the embryo. As every semi-literate person knows today, the first stage of the embryo is not the “form of the sperm” (or the “drop of seed” in Qur’anic parlance), but the woman’s fertilized ovum. Why do neither the Qur’an, nor of course its source, Galen, mention at all the woman’s ovum, which is just as important as the single sperm cell that fertilizes it?(*) Could it be because microscopes were developed only in the 17th century? But if Allah was the author of the Qur’an, he shouldn’t be hindered by the non-existence of microscopes! Don’t you agree? And don’t tell me again about those extra-sensitive Bedouins, because I’d accuse you of lower wit than even theirs. Would they really freak out if the Qur’an had said in 23:13 “Then We placed him as a pair of two seeds, from man and woman, in a safe lodging.” They didn’t freak out when Muhammad abolished their other gods; why should they do so upon hearing about “two seeds, from man and woman”? Don’t pretend to be dumb, my dear Muslim reader; you are intelligent, therefore you should be able to understand that Allah could talk in ways that would sound harmless to illiterate ancient Arabs, and at the same time make us unbelievers convert to Islam, because we would see immediately today that Muhammad’s information was revealed to him by a Higher Wisdom. Instead, the Qur’anic text is just as it should be if it were conceived of by an illiterate ancient Arab.
One question remains: if Muhammad plagiarized Galen, who lived four centuries before Muhammad, and since Muhammad was illiterate, how could Muhammad be aware of Galen’s theory of a four-stage embryonic development?
And yet, nothing remains a secret forever, hidden from the light of scientific search. In this page, the author of which is someone with the pen name of “Dr. Lactantius”, we read the following:
“[S]ome 26 books of Galen’s work were translated into Syriac as early as the sixth century AD by Sergios of Resh’ Aina (Ra’s al-Ain).[3] Sergios was a Christian priest who studied medicine in Alexandria and worked in Mesopotania, dying in Constantinople in about AD 532. He was one of a number of Nestorian (Syriac) Christians who translated the Greek medical corpus into Syriac. The Nestorians experienced persecution from the mainstream church and fled to Persia, where they brought their completed translations of the Greek physicians’ works and founded many schools of learning. The most famous of these by far was the great medical school of Jundishapur in what is now south-east Iran, founded in AD 555 by Anusharwan.
The major link between Islamic and Greek medicine must be sought in late Sasanian medicine, especially in the School of Jundishapur rather than that of Alexandria. At the time of the rise of Islam Jundishapur was at its prime. It was the most important medical centre of its time, combining the Greek, Indian and Iranian medical traditions in a cosmopolitan atmosphere which prepared the ground for Islamic medicine. The combining of different schools of medicine foreshadowed the synthesis that was to be achieved in later Islamic medicine.[4]
According to Muslim medical historians, including ibn Abi Usaybia and al-Qifti, the most celebrated early graduate of Jundishapur was a doctor named al Harith ibn Kalada.[5] Faced with the collection of Syriac manuscripts of Greek physicians which had recently been introduced to Jundishapur, it is inconceivable that he would not have been aware of Galen’s theories. Furthermore, al Harith was an older contemporary of Muhammed and became one of the Companions of the Prophet. We are told by Muslim historians that Muhammed actually sought medical advice from him[6], and his "teachings undoubtedly influenced the latter" [i.e., Muhammed].[7] Cyril Elgood writes:
"Such medical knowledge as Muhammed possessed, he may well have acquired from Haris bin Kalda [sic], an Arab, who is said to have left the desert for a while and gone to Jundishapur to study medicine ... On his return Haris settled in Mecca and became the foremost physician of the Arabs of the desert. Whether he ever embraced Islam is uncertain, but this did not prevent the Prophet from sending his sick friends to consult him."[8] ”
The numbers in square brackets refer to the sources of the above text, which the reader can examine after visiting the above-mentioned web page.
Whether the above is true or not, it certainly suggests a plausible way in which information from ancient Greek literature could have reached Muhammad, by way of hearsay; information which later Muhammad might have attributed to Allah, perhaps even genuinely believing that it comes from Allah, and not from his own mind. Yet that information is, as we saw, incomplete and inaccurate. Certainly it doesn’t look like the kind of “divine knowledge” that we’d expect from Allah.
So, given all the previous data, once again we have two theories to explain them:
Allah is the author of the above-mentioned verses. He described the development of the embryo in four stages, in a way which is suspiciously similar to that of the famous ancient Greek medical doctor Galen, perhaps because Allah also inspired Galen (?), who however was a pagan. Nonetheless, the four stages described in the Qur’an are wrong on several counts, most serious of which is that Allah neglects to mention the existence of the woman’s ovum. In general, Allah does not mention anything that requires a microscope to be seen, for reasons unknown and unexplained by this theory.
Muhammad is the author of the above-mentioned verses. He described the development of the embryo in four stages, plagiarizing the work of the ancient Greek medical doctor Galen, perhaps after having a hearsay acquaintance with it from doctors who had studied the ancient literature. Naturally, Muhammad’s four stages have errors, and do not mention anything that requires a microscope to be seen, for the obvious reason that the microscopes were developed only in the 17th century. This implies that Muhammad did not really receive information from Allah, but thought he received it.
As before, the question persists: given the evidence, and using your rational and objective judgment, which of the two theories appears more plausible to you?
Imo preca posla garant.
