sublimity of doctrine, or in richness or ele

gance

of language.

VII. 2. The revelation of the koran, by Mahomet's account, was made to him in parcels, and at different times. From his dictation, they were taken down in writing by his scribe. Abu Becre, his immediate successor, had a transcript of them carefully made, and deposited it with Hafsa, one of the prophet's widows. It was frequently copied. In the 30th year of the Hegira, the caliph Othman observing there was a great multitude of various readings in the copies, caused several copies to be made, with extreme care, of the exemplar deposited by Abu Becre with Hafsa. In imitation of the masoritical labours of the Jews, the Mahometans have computed every word and every letter of the koran, and introduced vowel points, which ascertain both its pronunciation and meaning. "The ge"neral doctrine of the koran," says Golius,

in Append. ad Gram. Erp. p. 176, (as he is translated by Mr. Sale), 66 seems to be, to "unite the professors of the three different "religions, then followed in the populous "country of Arabia, who, for the most part, "lived promiscuously, and wandered with"out guides, the far greater part being "idolaters, and the rest Jews and Chris"tians, mostly of erroneous and heterodox "belief, in the knowledge and worship of

66

66

one, eternal, indivisible God, by whose

power all things were made, and those "which are not, may be; the sole supreme

66

judge and absolute lord of the creation, "established under the sanction of certain "laws, and the outward sign of certain "ceremonies partly of antient and partly of "novel institution, and enforced by setting “before them rewards and punishments "both eternal and temporal, and to bring "them all to the obedience of Mahomet,

66

as the prophet and ambassador of God,

"who, after repeated admonitions, prophe

"cies and threats of former ages, was, at "last, to establish and propagate God's re

66

ligion on earth by force of arms, and to "be acknowledged chief pontiff in spiritual "matters, as well as supreme prince in temporals." The divine revelations were, according to Mahomet, to end with himself; and in him, the seal of prophecy was to be closed for ever. Frequent mention is made in the koran of the histories contained in the Old Testament, of those particularly, which shew the judgments of God on unbelievers and impugners of his holy word; but Mahomet appears to have taken his scriptural history rather from the apocryphal books and traditions of the Jews and heterodox christians, with whom Arabia abounded in his time, than from the canonical writings which compose the bible. (See Alcoranus ex variis collectus tum fontibus, tum paludibus, Compend. Theatr. Oriental, p. 20.) The koran contains also many legal and civil ordinances, as the prohibition of cer

tain meats, wine, and usury; some, that respect the payment of debts, the laws of heirship, wills, legacies, oaths, widows, divorces, marriages, murder, fornication, adultery, theft: but the greatest part of it turns on the obligation of making war against unbelievers, with the most splendid promises to those, who fight against them, and the most dreadful threats against those who refuse. The duty of alms-giving and general benevolence is inculcated in the strongest terms. It seems generally admitted that the stile is pure and elegant: it is, however, allowed by the Arabs themselves that this is not entirely the case, and that there are different Dialects in the koran. (See Ahmed Ibn Edris, p. 280). It contains many passages of great sublimity; but, as Mr. Gibbon justly observes, "the harmony and

copiousness of stile, will not, in a version, "reach the European infidel; he will pe"ruse, with impatience, the endless inco"herent rhapsody of fable, precept and

"declamation, which seldom excites a sen"timent or idea, which sometimes crawls "in the dust, and is sometimes lost in the "clouds. The divine attributes exalt the

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fancy of an Arabian missionary; but his "loftiest strains must yield to the sublime simplicity of the book of Job, composed "in a remote age, in the same country, and "in the same language." The koran consists of 114 sections, called in the original, suras. They are distinguished by titles, but are not numbered, and are divided into smaller portions. Seven principal exemplars have been made of the koran; two at Medina, a third at Mecca, a fourth at Cufa; a fifth at Bassorah, and a sixth in Syria; the seventh is the exemplar from which the common editions are taken. The Mahometans themselves have translated it into the Persic, Malayan, Javan and Turkish languages. Reineccius, (Historia Alcorani Leipsia, 1721), says, that the most beautiful manuscripts of the koran, are (1st) one