title: Il Divo

text: On 12 December 2008, Il Divo performed at the finals of Idol 2008 in the Stockholm Globe Arena. On 20 January 2009 they performed at the Purple Heart Inauguration Ball in Washington DC for Barack Obama. Il Divo's 2009 tour, An Evening with Il Divo, was their most geographically extensive, with more than 130 dates across six continents, visiting 31 countries and 81 cities, earning them the "Billboard" Breakthrough Award for the highest-grossing tour of the year.


title: Il Divo

text: On 1 December 2009, the first live album "" went public. The DVD + CD set includes "Bridge Over Trouble Water" and "The Impossible Dream" from "Man of La Mancha".


title: Il Divo

text: They ended 2009 with their first Christmas special intimate show, "Celebrate Christmas with Il Divo", which included a traditional repertoire of favourite festive songs with an orchestra and special guests in the United Kingdom, the United States, and Canada.


title: Il Divo

text: They started with two concerts at the Hammersmith Apollo in London on 7 and 8 December with violinist Vanessa-Mae and singer Camilla Kerslake, ending in the United States with six more concerts.


title: Il Divo

text: On 11 May 2011, Il Divo were invited to the Classic Brit Awards at the Royal Albert Hall in London to receive the award for "Artist of the Decade". The award recognised the impact the operatic group had had in the classical genre, having sold over 25 million albums worldwide between 2004 and 2011.


title: Il Divo

text: On 20 December 2011 in Paraguay, the quartet gave a concert in the Defensores del Chaco stadium for 33,900 people, closing the Bicentenary of the Independence of Paraguay. On 13 May 2012, Il Divo performed "Caruso" during the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II at Windsor for the entire royal family. In 2008, Il Divo performed at the Olympic torch handover party leading up to the 2012 Summer Olympics in London.


title: Il Divo

text: Il Divo & Orchestra in Concert World Tour was a worldwide tour of the six continents between May and September 2012. It was designed by creative director Brian Burke, who stated that "Il Divo is the perfect modern fusion of opera, theater, and concert. It is a privilege as a director to create a visual landscape inviting the audience on a theatrical journey of their music."


title: Il Divo

text: The group's seventh album, "A Musical Affair", was released on 5 November 2013. The songs featured arrangements tailored to the singers' voices. To promote the album, they held a concert at the Marquis Theatre on Broadway from 7 to 13 November 2013, called "Il Divo – A Musical Affair: The Greatest Songs of Broadway".


title: Il Divo

text: The world tour began in Japan in February 2014 and travelled around the world, ending on 1 November 2014 at the O2 Arena in Greenwich, London. On 19 July 2014, Il Divo sold out Edinburgh Castle, giving a concert featuring "Amazing Grace".


title: Il Divo

text: On 24 November 2014, a special edition of "A Musical Affair" was released, which includes new songs with French singers, partially or fully sung in French. On 1 December 2014, "Live in Japan" was released, which contains the A Musical Affair tour filmed at the Nippon Budokan Theater in Tokyo on 11 March 2014. The Japanese version includes the songs "Flowers Will Bloom" and "Furusato".


title: Il Divo

text: In 2014, on the 10th anniversary of the publication of their first album, the group sold over 28 million albums worldwide, achieving more than 50 number one sales and receiving 160 gold records and platinum in over 33 countries.


title: Il Divo

text: On 23 March 2015, it was announced that Il Divo was the winner of the 2015 Silver Clef Award, giving them the Classic PPL Nordoff Robbins Classical Award. The gala award ceremony took place on 3 July at the Grosvenor House Hotel.


title: Il Divo

text: Through Syco Music, on 6 November 2015 in Europa, 27 November in America and 25 October in Japan, Il Divo released "Amor & Pasión".


title: Il Divo

text: On 21 October, Il Divo performed the first public appearance to promote the sixth album on the program "Despierta America", the US network Univision, from Miami, playing his first single "Si voy a perderte (Don't Wanna Lose You)". They then performed the song "Bésame mucho" in Japan. They started the month of November in London, where they attended the second Music Industry Trust Awards.


title: Il Divo

text: "Amor & Pasión" debuted atop the US Latin Albums chart, with 5,000 copies sold in America in the first week, according to "Billboard". In Spain, the album debuted at number 10 on the Top 100 Álbumes list.


title: Il Divo

text: Carlos Marin died of COVID-19 on 19 December 2021. As a tribute, Il Divo performed a Greatest Hits Tour in 2022, with Mexican-American baritone Steven Labrie joining the group.


title: Il Divo

text: Besides music, the members of Il Divo are also known for their refined and elegant appearance, wearing almost exclusively suits by Giorgio Armani (Giorgio Armani, Emporio Armani and Armani Collezioni).


title: Il Divo

text: Il Divo changed the genre of opera with their musical combination of opera singing and classical music, with themes of different genres, including Latin, folk, ballads, church music, bolero and pop.


title: Il Divo

text: Il Divo records their songs in several languages: Spanish ("Regresa A Mí", "Hasta Mi Final", "La Vida Sin Amor"), English ("Mama", "Amazing Grace", "Don't Cry For Me Argentina"), Italian ("Senza Parole", "Passera", "Notte Di Luce"), French ("Pour Que Tu M'Aimes Encore", "Le Temps des Cathedrales"), Latin ("Panis Angelicus"), Portuguese ("Volta Pra Mim"), and Japanese ("Furusato"). Some songs incorporate more than one language in the same song, such as "The Man You Love" (Spanish and English), "Ave Maria" (Italian and Latin), and "I Believe In You" (English & French), whereas others are recorded in a single language, but sung live in two languages: "She" (Italian & English) and "Bring Him Home" (English & Spanish).


title: Il Divo

text: Most of the songs that they cover are reinterpreted from English and translated into the Spanish language, as the group have said that "Spanish is the language of Romanticism".


title: Il Divo

text: On 25 April 2007, Il Divo performed on "American Idol" in one of the "Idol Gives Back" episodes, which raised money for children in the US and Africa. For every vote cast during that show, Idol sponsors Coca-Cola, AT&T, and others donated money to the Charity Projects Entertainment Fund and other groups such as Save the Children and America's Second Harvest.


title: Il Divo

text: In 2011, they recorded "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" to raise money for the organisation Save the Children.


title: Il Divo

text: Il Divo is related indirectly in terms of sponsorship and help with the French NGO SMTA Assistance Médicale Toit du Monde since 2005, of which Izambard is the international official sponsor, and with Sanfilippo Children's Foundation, for which Izambard is the global ambassador.


title: Il Divo

text: Between 20 and 30 September 2015, Miller and Bühler participated in a motorbike ride from Miami to Los Angeles to raise funds for the Nordoff Robbins music therapy charity.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: Wide Sargasso Sea is a 1966 novel by Dominican-British author Jean Rhys. The novel serves as a postcolonial and feminist prequel to Charlotte Brontë's novel "Jane Eyre" (1847), describing the background to Mr. Rochester's marriage from the point-of-view of his wife Antoinette Cosway, a Creole heiress. Antoinette Cosway is Rhys's version of Brontë's devilish "madwoman in the attic". Antoinette's story is told from the time of her youth in Jamaica, to her unhappy marriage to an English gentleman, Mr. Rochester, who renames her Bertha, declares her mad, takes her to England, and isolates her from the rest of the world in his mansion. Antoinette is caught in a patriarchal society in which she fully belongs neither to Europe nor to Jamaica. "Wide Sargasso Sea" explores the power of relationships between men and women and discusses the themes of race, Caribbean history, and assimilation.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: Rhys lived in obscurity after her previous work, "Good Morning, Midnight", was published in 1939. She had published other novels between these works, but "Wide Sargasso Sea" caused a revival of interest in Rhys and her work and was her most commercially successful novel.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: In 2022, it was included on the "Big Jubilee Read" list of 70 books by Commonwealth authors, selected to celebrate the Platinum Jubilee of Elizabeth II.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: The novel, initially set in Jamaica, opens a short while after the Slavery Abolition Act 1833 abolished slavery in the British Empire on 1 August 1834. The protagonist Antoinette relates the story of her life from childhood to her arranged marriage to an English gentleman, Mr. Rochester.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: Part One takes place in Coulibri, a sugar plantation in Jamaica, and is narrated by Antoinette as a child. Formerly wealthy, since the abolition of slavery, the estate has become derelict and her family has been plunged into poverty. Antoinette's mother, Annette, must remarry to wealthy English gentleman Mr. Mason, who is hoping to exploit his new wife's situation. Angry at the returning prosperity of the planter class, emancipated slaves living in Coulibri burn down Annette's house, killing Antoinette's mentally disabled younger brother, Pierre. As Annette had been struggling with her mental health up until this point, the grief of losing her son weakens her sanity. Mr. Mason sends her to live with a couple who torment her until she dies. When Antoinette visits her after the fire, Annette refuses to see or speak to her. Antoinette visits her mother once more when she is older but is alarmed at the abuse she witnesses by the servants to her mother and goes away without speaking to her.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: Part Two alternates between the points of view of Antoinette and her husband during their honeymoon excursion to her mother's summer estate Granbois, Dominica. Likely catalysts for Antoinette's downfall are the mutual suspicions that develop between the couple, and the machinations of Daniel, who claims he is Antoinette's illegitimate half-brother; he impugns Antoinette's reputation and mental state and demands money to keep quiet. Antoinette's old nurse Christophine openly distrusts Mr. Rochester. His apparent belief in the stories about Antoinette's family and past aggravate the situation; her husband is unfaithful and emotionally abusive. He begins to call her Bertha rather than her real name and flaunts an affair in front of her to cause her pain. Antoinette's increased sense of paranoia and the bitter disappointment of her failing marriage unbalance her already precarious mental and emotional state. She flees to the house of Christophine. Antoinette pleads with Christophine for an obeah potion to attempt to reignite her husband's love, which Christophine reluctantly gives her. Antoinette returns home but the love potion acts like a poison on her husband. Subsequently he hardens his heart against reconciling with his wife and decides to take her away from Granbois out of spite.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: Part Three is the shortest part of the novel; it is from the perspective of Antoinette, renamed by her husband as Bertha. Mr. Rochester's father and brother have died, so he has returned to England with Antoinette to claim his sizeable inheritance. She is largely confined to "the attic" of Thornfield Hall, the mansion she calls the "Great House". The story traces her relationship with Grace Poole, the servant who is tasked with guarding her, as well as her disintegrating life with Mr. Rochester, as he hides her from the world. He promises to come to her more but never does. Antoinette is thought mad by those who interact with her and has little understanding of how much time she has been confined. She dreams of freedom, when she remembers, and writes to her stepbrother Richard in Jamaica who, however, says he cannot not "interfere legally" with her husband. Desperate and enraged, she attacks him with a knife bought in secret. She later forgets this encounter. Expressing her thoughts in stream of consciousness, Antoinette dreams of flames engulfing the house and her freedom from the life she has there, and believes it is her destiny to fulfill the vision. Waking from her dream she escapes her room, and sets out candle in hand.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: Since the late 20th century, critics have considered "Wide Sargasso Sea" as a postcolonial response to "Jane Eyre". Rhys uses multiple voices (Antoinette's, her husband's, and Grace Poole's) to tell the story, and intertwines her novel's plot with that of "Jane Eyre". In addition, Rhys makes a postcolonial argument when she ties Antoinette's husband's eventual rejection of Antoinette to her Creole heritage (a rejection shown to be critical to Antoinette's descent into madness). The novel is also considered a feminist work, as it deals with unequal power between men and women, particularly in marriage.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: Antoinette and her family were planters who owned slaves until the passage of the Slavery Abolition Act, which resulted in the family losing their wealth. They are pejoratively called "white nigger" or "white cockroach" by the island's Black inhabitants because of their poverty and are openly despised, harassed, and assaulted. The villagers, inadvertently or not, kill Antoinette's brother, setting fire to the home and seem poised to murder the rest of the family if not for the apparition of an ill omen - their dying green parrot. Meanwhile, Rochester looks down on Antoinette because of her status as a Creole. Scholar Lee Erwin describes this paradox through the scene in which Antoinette's childhood home Coulibri is burned down and she runs to Tia, a black girl her own age, to "be like her". Tia attacks Antoinette, throwing a rock at her head. Antoinette then says she sees Tia "as if I saw myself. Like in a looking glass". Erwin argues that "even as she claims to be seeing "herself," she is simultaneously seeing "the other", that which only defines the self by its separation from it, in this case literally by means of a cut. History here, in the person of a former slave's daughter, is figured as refusing Antoinette", the daughter of a slave owner.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: In the novel, Rhys also explores the legacy of slavery and the slave trade, focusing on how abolition dramatically affected the status of Antoinette's family as planters in colonial Jamaica. Scholar Trevor Hope has noted that the "triumphant conflagration of Thornfield Hall in "Wide Sargasso Sea" may at one level mark a vengeful attack upon the earlier textual structure". The destruction of Thornfield Hall occurs in both novels; however, Rhys epitomises the fire as a liberating experience for Antoinette. Hope has suggested that the novel "[takes] residence inside the textual domicile of empire in order to bring about its disintegration or even, indeed, its conflagration".


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: Rhys' editor Diana Athill discusses the events surrounding the publication of the book in her memoir. The book came out of a friendship between Rhys and Selma Vaz Dias who encouraged her to start writing again. At the time, Rhys was living in a shack made of corrugated iron and tar paper in a slum neighbourhood of Cheriton Fitzpaine. The book was virtually completed in November 1964 when Rhys, who was 74 years old and complained of the cold and rain in her shack, suffered a heart attack. Athill cared for Rhys in the hospital for two years, keeping a promise not to publish the book until Rhys was well enough to compile the manuscript and add a few final lines. The income from the book provided enough money for Rhys to improve her living conditions.


title: Wide Sargasso Sea

text: On 5 November 2019, "BBC News" listed "Wide Sargasso Sea" on its list of the 100 most influential novels.


title: Wrenn Schmidt

text: Melinda Wrenn Schmidt (born February 18, 1983) is an American actress. She is best known for her starring role as NASA engineer, flight director and later Director of NASA Margo Madison in the Apple TV+ original science fiction space drama series "For All Mankind". Other television roles include Julia Sagorsky in the period drama series "Boardwalk Empire" (2012–2013), as KGB handler Kate in the spy drama series "The Americans" (2014), as Dr Iris Campbell on the thriller series "Person of Interest" (2014–2016), as Megan Holter in the horror series "Outcast" (2016–2018), Her film roles include the horror film "Preservation" (2014), the biographical drama "I Saw the Light" (2015), the war film "" (2016), the romantic comedy, "The Good Catholic" (2017) and the science fiction horror film "Nope" (2022).


title: Wrenn Schmidt

text: Schmidt was born in Lexington, South Carolina. Her father is a biology professor, and her mother is a former dietitian. She comes from mixed European heritage; German from her father, but also English, Scotch-Irish, Polish, and Austrian, among others. She attended the residential high school South Carolina Governor's School for the Arts & Humanities in Greenville, graduating from their inaugural drama class in 2001. She then attended Southern Methodist University's Meadows School of the Arts in University Park, Texas, graduating summa cum laude in 2005 with a B.F.A. in theatre studies and history. She had a part in the George F. Walker play, "Heaven", at Dallas' Kitchen Dog Theater in 2003. Schmidt moved to New York City to intern with an off-Broadway theatre company, and worked three jobs as she began auditioning for acting roles.


title: Wrenn Schmidt

text: Schmidt was first cast in "Crazy for the Dog" in 2006 by the Jean Cocteau Repertory. She served as an understudy in a national tour of Edward Albee's "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?", starring Bill Irwin and Kathleen Turner, directed by Anthony Page. The role led to her finding a talent agent, and to her first television appearances on NBC's "Law & Order" and CBS' "3 lbs" in 2006. She appeared in the title role of "Sive" at the Irish Repertory Theatre in 2007, and was then an understudy in a revival of "Come Back, Little Sheba" on Broadway. In 2009, Schmidt appeared off-Broadway at the Harold Clurman Theatre as Cleopatra in "Caesar and Cleopatra", at the Cherry Lane Theatre in "Jailbait", and regionally in "Proof" at Cape May Stage.


title: Wrenn Schmidt

text: Schmidt made her film debut in the 2010 documentary "", portraying a prostitute who refused to appear on camera. She had parts that year on NBC's "Mercy", and in the play "Phantom Killer", about the 1946 Texarkana Moonlight Murders. Schmidt made her feature film debut in "Our Idiot Brother", a comedy-drama starring Paul Rudd, Elizabeth Banks, and Zooey Deschanel, which premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. She was also cast in the play "Be a Good Little Widow" at Ars Nova, and in Teresa Deevy's "Temporal Powers" at Manhattan's Mint Theater in 2011. In 2012, Schmidt became a regular on the HBO Prohibition-era crime drama, "Boardwalk Empire", playing Julia Sagorsky. She also played Ruth Atkins in the Eugene O’Neill play, "Beyond the Horizon", at the Irish Repertory Theatre.


title: Wrenn Schmidt

text: Schmidt returned to the Mint Theater in 2013 to play the title character in Teresa Deevy's "Katie Roche", and starred opposite John Turturro as Hilde Wangel in Henrik Ibsen's "The Master Builder" at the Harvey Theater. She had a number of recurring roles on television in 2014. She played Kate, a KGB handler, on the FX series, "The Americans", for six episodes. She also played Jenna Olson on FX's "Tyrant", and Dr. Iris Campbell on "Person of Interest". Schmidt starred alongside Aaron Staton and Pablo Schreiber in the 2014 horror-thriller film "Preservation", which was directed by Christopher Denham and premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival. She then appeared in the 2015 Hank Williams biopic film "I Saw the Light", starring Tom Hiddleston and Elizabeth Olsen. She played Bobbie Jett, who had a short-lived relationship with Williams, and gave birth to their daughter, Jett Williams.


title: Wrenn Schmidt

text: In 2016, Schmidt had a role opposite John Krasinski in the Michael Bay film, "", which portrays the 2012 Benghazi attack in Libya. She also joined the cast of the Cinemax drama series, "Outcast", based on a Robert Kirkman graphic novel about demonic possession. Schmidt appeared with Danny Glover and John C. McGinley in the independent romantic comedy, "The Good Catholic". Schmidt stars in Apple TV+ original series "For All Mankind" (2019–present), which explores an alternate history where the Soviet Union reaches the moon before the United States, leading to the Space Race continuing far beyond its historical end, playing the central role of NASA engineer Margo Madison.


title: Fajita

text: A fajita (; ), in Tex-Mex cuisine, is any stripped grilled meat with stripped peppers and onions usually served on a flour or corn tortilla. The term originally referred to skirt steak, the cut of beef first used in the dish. Popular alternatives to skirt steak include chicken and other cuts of beef, as well as vegetables instead of meat. In restaurants, the meat is usually cooked with onions and bell peppers. Popular condiments include shredded lettuce, sour cream, guacamole, salsa, pico de gallo, shredded cheese, refried beans, and diced tomatoes. "Arrachera", another term for skirt steak, is also applied to a northern Mexican variant of the dish.


title: Fajita

text: "Fajita" is a Tex-Mex, Texan-Mexican American or Tejano, diminutive term for little strips of meat cut from the beef skirt, the most common cut used to make fajitas. The word "fajita" is not known to have appeared in print until 1971, according to the "Oxford English Dictionary". (The word "faja" is Spanish for "strip", or "belt", from the Latin "fascia", "band") Although "fajita" originally referred to these strips of beef skirt, fajitas now are made with a variety of fillings, such as green/red/yellow peppers, onions, chilies, and jalapeño peppers.


title: Fajita

text: The first culinary evidence of the fajitas with the cut of meat, the cooking style (directly on a campfire or on a grill), and the Spanish nickname goes back as far as the 1930s in the ranch lands of South and West Texas. During cattle roundups, cows were butchered regularly to feed the hands. Items such as the hide, the head, the entrails, and meat trimmings such as the skirt were given to the Mexican cowboys called vaqueros as part of their pay. Hearty border dishes like barbacoa de cabeza (head barbecue), menudo (tripe stew), and fajitas or arracheras (grilled skirt steak) have their roots in this practice. Considering the limited number of skirts per carcass and the fact the meat was not available commercially, the fajita tradition remained regional and relatively obscure for many years, probably familiar only to vaqueros, butchers, and their families.


title: Fajita

text: In September 1969, Sonny Falcón, an Austin meat market manager, operated the first commercial fajita taco concession stand at a rural Diez y Seis celebration in Kyle, Texas. During that same year, Otilia Garza introduced fajitas at the Round-Up Restaurant in Pharr, Texas. Garza is credited with adding the signature sizzling plate presentation of fajitas after being served "queso flameado" (melted Mexican cheese) on a cast-iron plate in Acapulco.


title: Fajita

text: The food was popularized by various businesses, such as Ninfa's in Houston, the Hyatt Regency in Austin, and numerous restaurants in San Antonio. In southern Arizona, the term was unknown except as a cut of meat until the 1990s, when Mexican fast food restaurants started using the word in their marketing. In recent years, fajitas have become popular at American casual dining restaurants as well as in home cooking.


title: Fajita

text: In many restaurants, the fajita meat and vegetables are brought to the table sizzling loudly on a metal platter or skillet, along with warmed tortillas and condiments such as guacamole, pico de gallo, queso, salsa, shredded cheese or sour cream.


title: Fajita

text: The Kyle, Texas, city council voted in August 2020 to change the name of a controversially named road, Rebel Drive, to Fajita Drive in honor of local history of the fajita, but the change was rescinded within days in response to public distaste for the new name. The council later renamed the street Veterans Drive.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: Christopher Alan Pallies (November 7, 1955 – March 5, 2019) was an American professional wrestler, actor and stand-up comedian, better known by his wrestling gimmick and ring name, King Kong Bundy. Under this gimmick, he portrayed a pugnacious, trash-talking villain character. He appeared in the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) in the mid-1980s and mid-1990s and wrestled in the main event of WrestleMania 2 in 1986, facing Hulk Hogan in a steel cage match for the WWF World Heavyweight Championship. He also headlined the inaugural Survivor Series in 1987, as well as the first edition of Extreme Championship Wrestling's flagship event, November to Remember, in 1993.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: Christopher Alan Pallies was born in Woodbury, New Jersey, on November 7, 1955, to Donald Pallies, a railroad freight agent, and Margret (McCarthy) Pallies, a department store clerk. He attended Washington Township High School in Sewell, New Jersey, graduating in 1973. He had two sisters and three brothers. While in high school, Pallies wrestled heavyweight on the wrestling team. He won two regional titles. His brother Jeff, also a member of the wrestling team, later wrestled for Glassboro State, now known as Rowan University. He was a two-time Metro Conference champion.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: Pallies was trained to wrestle by Larry Sharpe at the "Monster Factory" in Bellmawr, New Jersey. He debuted on March 7, 1981, wrestling for the World Wrestling Federation under the ring name "Chris Canyon". His first victory was against Strong Kobayashi in WWF on July 10, 1981. In the early years of his career, he also used the name "Chris Cannon". In 1982, Pallies relocated to Texas, where he joined the World Class Championship Wrestling. He was developed by the Von Erich family as the babyface "Big Daddy Bundy" (after Shirley Crabtree's "Big Daddy" moniker), wearing blue jeans with a rope belt, but turned heel following a dispute with the Von Erich Family, and was recruited by "Playboy" Gary Hart and dramatically reintroduced as "King Kong Bundy", with the "Big Daddy" portion of his moniker replaced by the name of cinematic monster, King Kong, wearing the black singlet for the first time to signify his change. He lost his hair during the feud, adding to his signature look. Bundy was Fritz Von Erich's opponent for Fritz's 1982 retirement match at the Fritz Von Erich Retirement Show held at the Texas Stadium. He also competed in various territories such as the American Wrestling Association and National Wrestling Alliance. He also had a tendency to demand a five-count (as opposed to the usual three count) for pinfalls whenever he dominated his opponent in a squash match, a gimmick he began while wrestling for Mid-South Wrestling. During this time Bundy also wrestled in Memphis often teaming with Rick Rude and Jim Neidhart against opponents such as Jerry Lawler.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: After making a few appearances on New Japan Pro-Wrestling/World Wrestling Federation joint shows in early 1985, Bundy officially debuted in the WWF on the March 16, 1985 airing of "WWF Championship Wrestling", defeating Mario Mancini. First managed by Jimmy Hart, he was immediately pushed with dominating victories over all of his opponents. Bundy also reprised his gimmick of demanding a five-count from the referee while pinning an opponent, to show how badly he had beaten his hapless opponent. He defeated S. D. Jones in what was announced as only nine seconds at the first WrestleMania at Madison Square Garden (it was actually about 17 seconds).<ref name="Bundy/Jones"></ref> This remained the shortest match in WrestleMania history until 2008 when Kane defeated Chavo Guerrero Jr. in a legitimate eight seconds at WrestleMania XXIV. (Kane's record would subsequently go on to be broken by The Rock).


title: King Kong Bundy

text: In September 1985, Hart traded Bundy to manager Bobby Heenan in exchange for Adrian Adonis and The Missing Link. After joining the Heenan Family, Bundy feuded extensively with André the Giant, a feud which started during an angle where Bundy interfered in one of André's matches and delivered several splashes, giving the Giant a kayfabe broken sternum. They feuded for several months, including a pair of tag team matches on "Saturday Night's Main Event II" and "III" in late 1985, where Bundy, and André's other nemesis, Big John Studd, first faced André and Tony Atlas and then André and WWF World Heavyweight Champion Hulk Hogan. On September 23, 1985, Bundy faced André the Giant at Madison Square Garden in a match billed as "the Colossal Jostle". André dominated the match, with the match ending after Big John Studd came from the locker rooms to Bundy's aid and attacked the Giant, causing a disqualification. Bundy also began targeting Hogan and the WWF World Championship in late 1985. At "Saturday Night's Main Event V", Hogan was dominating challenger the Magnificent Muraco when Bundy (with Heenan in tow) ran to ambush Hogan. With Muraco's help, Bundy repeatedly gave Hogan avalanches and big splashes, which caused Hogan to severely bruise his ribs (kayfabe). Bundy demanded a match and claimed Hogan was afraid of him, setting up their feud. Hogan demanded revenge and agreed to a steel cage match for the WWF World Heavyweight Championship as the main event of WrestleMania 2 in the Los Angeles portion of the event, which Hogan won.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: Later in 1986, Bundy reformed his tag-team partnership with Studd and began a feud with The Machines, Bill Eadie and Blackjack Mulligan wrestling under masks (as the Super Machine and Big Machine, respectively) and often joined by Andre the Giant (as the Giant Machine). The storyline was that Bundy and Studd, along with Heenan, claimed that the Giant Machine was a masked Andre the Giant, and was competing under the mask and alias to circumvent an earlier suspension (due to no-showing for an event), but none of them ever proved that Andre and the Giant Machine were one and the same. Eventually, Bundy and Studd began teaming up with Heenan in a series of six-man tag team matches against the Machines (usually, Big and Super; as Andre's health was starting to deteriorate at this time, the Giant Machine made occasional appearances, but more often than not, it was either Captain Lou Albano or a number of popular faces—often, Hogan, Roddy Piper and others—who teamed with the other Machines). Bundy and Studd were regularly beaten, but won their last match over the Super-Big version of the Machines at Madison Square Garden. Also in the latter half of 1986, Bundy and Studd received shots at the WWF Tag Team Championship against The British Bulldogs, but were unsuccessful, often losing by disqualification. Studd left the WWF shortly after their last match with the Machines, and Bundy went back to singles competition.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: At WrestleMania III, Bundy was involved in a mixed six-man tag team match, teaming up with midget wrestlers Little Tokyo and Lord Littlebrook against Hillbilly Jim, the Haiti Kid and Little Beaver. During the match, after being pestered by Beaver, Bundy body-slammed him and delivered a big elbow, causing his team's disqualification and his own tag partners to turn against him. At the 1987 King of the Ring on September 4, Bundy made it to the finals of the King of the Ring tournament, where he was defeated by Randy Savage. In November 1987, Bundy defeated Hulk Hogan via a count-out on an episode of "Saturday Night's Main Event XIII", but lost to Hogan in a rematch on the next episode of the series; the match was best known for the referee becoming legitimately injured when he was accidentally caught between Hogan and a charging Bundy, and Andre the Giant's post-match attack of Hogan shortly after Bundy left ringside. Although no longer appearing on the WWF's syndicated TV shows, Bundy continued to wrestle house shows in early 1988 (often losing to Bam Bam Bigelow); his last match during his initial WWF run was a televised match at Madison Square Garden in February 1988, teaming up with One Man Gang in a loss to Don Muraco and The Ultimate Warrior.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: After leaving the WWF in 1988, Bundy went into semi-retirement, wrestling only a handful of matches. In 1993, he wrestled in the main event of Eastern Championship Wrestling's inaugural November to Remember supercard, appearing as the mystery tag team partner of Terry Funk in a losing effort against Road Warrior Hawk and Sabu. On May 13, 1994, Bundy defeated Papa Shango at NWA New Jersey. In the summer of 1994, he made a couple of appearances for United States Wrestling Association and also feuded with "Friendly" Frank Finnegan in the WWA in 1994.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: Bundy returned to the WWF in the fall of 1994 as a member of Ted DiBiase's stable, The Million Dollar Corporation. He had a successful pay-per-view return at the Survivor Series, when he and fellow "Million Dollar Team" member Bam Bam Bigelow survived a match against Lex Luger's "Guts and Glory" team. Bundy was then billed as a favorite in the 1995 Royal Rumble, but lasted only three minutes before being eliminated by another big man, Mabel. Bundy made his return to WrestleMania at WrestleMania XI, where he was defeated by the Undertaker, Bundy was later pushed down the card before being released in October 1995 after teaming with Kama losing to Bam Bam Bigelow and Henry O. Godwinn for a dark match for WWF Superstars of Wrestling.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: After leaving the WWF in late 1995, Bundy wrestled for several independent promotions in the United States including the WWA where he had wrestled in 1994. In April 1997, he resurfaced in magazines when he joined a faction managed by Kenny Casanova called "Camp Casanova" along with "Danger" Dave DeJohn and the Masked Maniac at times in USWF, NBW, and USA Power Pro Wrestling. In a match against "the Seven Foot Tall" Primo Canera III, Bundy knee-dropped his opponent and then "Bundy-splashed" him. The impact actually broke the ring, leaving the two grapplers in a pit in the center of the squared circle. This independent footage was picked up by "Pro Wrestling Illustrated". His feuds against "Superfly" Jimmy Snuka, Doink the Clown, and Tom Brandi were among many main events in the northeast independent circuit. In 1999, at the Kolf Arena in Oshkosh, Wisconsin he won the AWA Superstars of Wrestling Heavyweight Championship from Jonnie Stewart. Later that same year, Bundy the reigning AWA heavyweight champion, wrestled again headlining an AWA "Super Event" at the Dee Events Center in Ogden, Utah. That night ended differently for Bundy, losing a "body-slam match" to Koszmar Polski who was managed by Ken Patera. Bundy still wrestled across the country, primarily in the Southern and Eastern United States. He generally continued to be a headliner and a crowd favorite at all events he attended. King Kong Bundy's last match is thought to have been at the Legends of Wrestling Show at the Pulaski County Fair in Somerset, Kentucky in 2007. Bundy lost to "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan in that main event. He defeated Richard Byrne in May 2007 at Big Time Wrestling in Springfield, Massachusetts in the last match of his wrestling career.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: In 1986, Pallies appeared in television commercials and print advertisements for the Vendex HeadStart personal computer. Bundy had two guest spots and one bit part on "Married... with Children", as the creators had named the lead characters "Bundy" as an homage to him. In 1987, he played Uncle Irwin, the brother of Peggy Bundy. In 1995, he appeared again as the King Kong Bundy character, teaching Bud how to wrestle. In 1988, he appeared in the Richard Pryor film "Moving" as Gorgo, part of a trio of ex-cons who are insolent and careless movers. In 1996, he appeared on an episode of "Weird Science" as himself. He had also appeared on sitcom "Boy Meets World". He is on the cover of Belgian band Belgian Asociality's 2009 album "Kabaal". On April 24, 2008, he was on a Norwegian TV show called "Golden GOAL!". Bundy also starred as Otto Belmar in the 2011 independent film "Fight the Panda Syndicate".


title: King Kong Bundy

text: After retiring from wrestling, Pallies tried a career in stand-up comedy. He would perform regularly at various comedy clubs such as the Coffee Dot Comedy in Sea Isle City.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: Pallies was with Debbie Smith in the early 1980s and she had a son named David that Pallies raised as his own. Pallies was fond of cats and had "about 10" at the time of his death.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: In July 2016, Pallies joined a class action lawsuit filed against WWE which alleged that wrestlers incurred "long term neurological injuries" and that the company "routinely failed to care" for them and "fraudulently misrepresented and concealed" the nature and extent of those injuries. The suit was litigated by attorney Konstantine Kyros, who has been involved in a number of other lawsuits against WWE. The case was dismissed by US District Judge Vanessa Lynne Bryant in September 2018. Anthony Mango of Bleacher Report wrote that Pallies had a strained relationship with WWE over the years and his involvement in the lawsuit likely prevented the company from inducting him into their Hall of Fame.


title: King Kong Bundy

text: Pallies died on March 4, 2019, in Glassboro, New Jersey, at the age of 63, of complications from diabetes.


title: History of the Quran

text: History of the Quran is the timeline and origin of the written compilations or manuscripts of the holy book of Islam, based on historical findings. It spans several centuries, and forms an important major part of the early history of Islam.


title: History of the Quran

text: According to the traditional Muslim belief and Islamic scholarly accounts, the revelation of the Quran began in 610 AD when the angel Gabriel (believed to have been sent by God) appeared to Muhammad (a trader in the Western Arabian city of Mecca, which had become a sanctuary for pagan deities and an important trading center) in the cave of Hira.,


title: History of the Quran

text: According to Islamic tradition, the revelations started one night during the month of Ramadan in 610 AD, when Muhammad, at the age of forty, received the first visit from the angel Gabriel, reciting to him the first verses of Surah Al-Alaq. Muslims believe that Muhammad continued to have revelations until his death in 632 AD.


title: History of the Quran

text: According to Islamic tradition, the Quran was first compiled into a comprehensive book by Abu Bakr. As the Islamic Empire began to grow, and differing recitations were heard, the rasm - or consonantal skeleton of the Quran - was compiled for uniformity in recitation under the direction of the third caliph, Uthman ibn Affan (r. 644–656 AD). For this reason, the Quran as it exists today is also known as the Uthmanic codex. According to Francis Edward Peters (1991), what was done to the Quran in the process seems to have been extremely conservative and the content was formed in a mechanical fashion to avoid redactional bias. Arabic orthography continued to develop into the second century, allowing qira'at, or variant oral readings of the rasm, to be documented in Quranic manuscripts.


title: History of the Quran

text: Gerd R. Puin, a renowned Islamicist scholar at Saarland University, was the head of the Sanaa manuscript restoration project commissioned by the Yemeni government. His findings led Dr. Puin to assert that the Quran had undergone a "textual evolution" with textual variations, unconventional ordering of the chapters (surahs), rare styles of orthography, and may include stories that were written before Muhammed began his ministry and which have subsequently been rewritten. The Yemeni government subsequently denied him any further access to the manuscripts.


title: History of the Quran

text: Non-Muslim people questioned the nature and modes of Muhammad's revelations. The Meccans interpreted the Quranic revelations based on their understanding of 'inspiration'. For them, poetry was closely connected to inspiration from a higher spiritual source. For this reason when Muhammad began preaching and reciting the Quran, the Meccans accused him of being a poet or a "poet possessed".


title: History of the Quran

text: There are disagreements among scholars as to when the Quran was first compiled. A hadith in Sahih al-Bukhari states that the caliph Abu Bakr commanded Zayd ibn Thabit to compile the written Quran, relying upon both textual fragments and the memories of those who had memorized it. Some Shia Muslims believe that Ali ibn Abi Talib was the first to compile the Quran into one written text, a task completed shortly after the death of Muhammad.


title: History of the Quran

text: The Quran uses the term "ummi" to describe Muhammad. The majority of Muslim scholars interpret this word as a reference to an illiterate individual, though some modern scholars instead interpret it as a reference to those who belong to a community without a scripture.


title: History of the Quran

text: According to the famous Sunni collector of traditions of Muhammad, Muhammad al-Bukhari (who lived about 250 years after Muhammad), Muhammad's wife Khadija bint Khuwaylid described that the first Quranic revelation occurred when the angel Gabriel visited Muhammad and asked him to recite. Muhammad responded "ma ana bīqāre'u", which could be translated into a number of ways: 'I do not read' or 'what am I to read/recite?' or 'I will not read/recite'. Gabriel pressed him "until all the strength went out of me; thereupon he released me and said: 'Read!'" This was repeated three times and upon the third, Gabriel released him and said, "Read in the name of the Sustainer who created humankind from a clot! Read! And your Sustainer is the most Beautiful." After this Muhammad continued to have revelations sporadically over a period of twenty-three years, until shortly before his death in 11/632.


title: History of the Quran

text: Muslims believe that Gabriel brought the word of God to Muhammad verbatim, and the Quran was divinely protected from any alteration or change. The Quran emphasizes that Muhammad was required only to receive the sacred text and that he had no authority to change it. It is also believed that God did not make himself known through the revelations; it was his will that was revealed.


title: History of the Quran

text: ""Sometimes it is revealed like the ringing of a bell. This form of inspiration is the hardest of them all and then it passes off after I have grasped what is inspired. Sometimes the Angel comes in the form of a man and talks to me and I grasp whatever he says.""


title: History of the Quran

text: At times, it was also reported that the experience was painful for Muhammad. For example, he had been heard saying, "Never once did I receive a revelation without thinking that my soul had been torn away from me."


title: History of the Quran

text: After Muhammad would receive revelations, he would later recite it to his Companions, who also memorized it or wrote it down. Before the Quran was commonly available in written form, speaking it from memory prevailed as the mode of teaching it to others. The practice of memorizing the whole Quran is still practised among Muslims. Millions of people have memorized the entire Quran in Arabic. This fact, taken in the context of 7th-century Arabia, was not an extraordinary feat. People of that time had a penchant for recited poetry and had developed their skills in memorization to a remarkable degree. Events and competitions that featured the recitation of elaborate poetry were of great interest.


title: History of the Quran

text: In Pre-Islamic Arabia, the society during the time of Muhammad was predominantly oral, and for this reason he would recite the Quranic verses to his Companions for them to memorize. Therefore, it is unknown whether the Quran was ever written and collected during the time of Muhammad. While writing was not a common skill during Muhammad's time, Mecca, being a commercial center, had a number of people who could write. Some scholars believe that several scribes including Zayd ibn Thabit and Ubay ibn Ka'b recorded verses of the Quran. This provides an explanation as to how the Quran existed in written form during the life of Muhammad, even if it was not compiled into one text.


title: History of the Quran

text: Sunni and Shia Muslim scholars generally believe that the Quran was written down in its entirety at the time of Muhammad's death. Muhammad's cousin, Ibn Abbas, describes the way in which the final version of the Quran was fixed: "the prophet recited the book before Gabriel every year in the month of Ramadan, and in the month in which he died he recited it before him twice." It is believed that the term "reciting the Quran twice" means compiling all the Quranic revelations into a complete and final version. It is understood that toward the end of Muhammad's life a special act of revelation occurred in which a final and complete version of the Quran was created. The term 'recite', which is used here, is referring to the custom where a Quranic scholar recites the entire Quran from beginning to end a number of times before a senior scholar. According to this tradition the act of recital is being performed by Muhammad, with the angel Gabriel playing the role of superior authority.


title: History of the Quran

text: In one of the hadith Muhammad is recorded as saying: "I leave among you two things of high estimation: the Book of God and my Family." Some scholars argue that this provides evidence that the Quran had been collected and written during this time because it is not correct to call something "al-kitab" (book) when it is merely in the [people's] memories. The word "al-kitab" signifies a single and united entity and does not apply to a text which is scattered and not collected. However, Alan Jones has explored the use of this word in the Quran, finding that there is no evidence that it was used in such a "concrete sense" in reference to the Quran and other scriptures, but instead evidence points to an "abstract meaning". He further considers the role of writing among Arabs in the early seventh century and accounts in the Sira of the dictation of parts of the Quran to scribes towards the end of the Medinan period.


title: History of the Quran

text: Another argument some Shia and Sunni scholars bring up is the importance that Muhammad attached to the Quran. They believe that since Muhammad put so much importance to the Quran he had to have ordered the writing of it during his lifetime. For example, Zayd ibn Thabit reported, "We used to record the Quran from parchments in the presence of the Messenger of God."


title: History of the Quran

text: Some authors believe that, as long as Muhammad was alive, there was always the expectation of further revelation as well as occasional abrogations. Any formal collection of the material already revealed could not properly be considered a complete text.


title: History of the Quran

text: According to Sunni scholars, during the life of Muhammad parts of the Quran, though written, were scattered among his companions, much of it as private possession. The number of scribes was 43 companions. And there were many people who though were not scribes also were complete memorizers. After Muhammad's death, Abu Bakr initially exercised a policy of "laissez faire" as well. This policy was reversed after the Battle of Yamama in 633. During the battle, 70 Muslims who had memorized the Quran were killed. The death of Salim, however, was most significant, as he was one of the very few who had been entrusted by Muhammad to teach the Quran. Consequently, upon Umar's insistence, Abu Bakr ordered the collection of the hitherto scattered pieces of the Quran into one copy.


title: History of the Quran

text: Zayd ibn Thabit, Muhammad's primary scribe, was assigned the duty of gathering all of the Quranic text. He gives an insight into what happened during the meeting between Abu Bakr, Umar, and himself:


title: History of the Quran

text: Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani draws special attention to Zayd's statement, "I found two verses of Sura al-Bara'a with Abu Khuzaima al-Ansari," as demonstrating that Zayd's own writings and memorization were not deemed sufficient. Everything required verification. Ibn Hajar further comments:


title: History of the Quran

text: The task required Zayd ibn Thabit to collect written copies of the Quran, with each verse having been validated with the oral testimony of at least two companions. The Quran was collected under the auspices of committee of four senior ranking Companions headed by Zayd ibn Thabit. This compilation was kept by the Caliph Abu Bakr, after his death by his successor, Caliph Umar, who on his deathbed gave them to Hafsa bint Umar, his daughter and one of Muhammad's widows.


title: History of the Quran

text: Of those ten, the two most important people were Zayd ibn Thabit the personal scribe of Muhammad and Ubay ibn Ka'b who was the foremost authority on the Quran after Zaid.


title: History of the Quran

text: The Shia view of the Qur'an differs from the Sunni view, but the majority of both groups believe that the text is identical. While some Shia disputed the canonical validity of the Uthmanic codex, the Shia Imams always rejected the idea of alteration of Qur'an's text.


title: History of the Quran

text: According to Islamic tradition, the process of canonization ended under the third caliph, Uthman ibn Affan (r. 23/644–35/655), about twenty years after the death of Muhammad in 650 CE, though date is not exact because it was not recorded by early Arab annalists.


title: History of the Quran

text: The Qur'anic canon is the form of the Quran as recited and written in which it is religiously binding for the Muslim community. This canonical corpus is closed and fixed in the sense that nothing in the Quran can be changed or modified.


title: History of the Quran

text: By the time of Uthman's caliphate, there was a perceived need for clarification of Qur'an reading. The Caliphate had grown considerably, expanding into Iraq, Syria, Egypt, and Iran, bringing into Islam's fold many new converts from various cultures with varying degrees of isolation. These converts spoke a variety of languages but were not well learned in Arabic, and so Uthman felt it was important to standardize the written text of the Quran into one specific Arabic dialect. Another reason for compiling the Quran was that many Muslims who had memorized the Quran in its entirety ("huffaz") were dying, especially in battle.


title: History of the Quran

text: According to the dominant version narrated by Bukhari, the reason for the final collection of the Quran was a dispute between Muslim forces from Iraq and Syria over the correct way of reciting it during communal prayers while on an expedition to Armenia and Azerbaijan.


title: History of the Quran

text: It is believed that the general Hudhayfah ibn al-Yaman reported this problem to the caliph and asked him to establish a unified text. According to the history of al-Tabari, during the expedition there were 10,000 Kufan warriors, 6,000 in Azerbaijan and 4,000 at Rayy. A large number of soldiers disagreeing about the correct way of reciting the Quran may have caused Hudhayfah to promote a unified text. An example of the confusion at this time is seen during a campaign in Tabaristan, where one of the soldiers asked Hudhayfah, "How did the Messenger of God pray?" Hudhayfah told him the soldier prayed before fighting.


title: History of the Quran

text: It is believed upon Hudhayfah's request Uthman obtained the sheets of the Quran from Ḥafṣa and appointed a commission consisting of Zayd and three prominent Meccans, and instructed them to copy the sheets into several volumes based on the dialect of Quraysh, the main tribe of Mecca.


title: History of the Quran

text: When the task was finished Uthman kept one copy in Medina and sent others to Kufa, Baṣra, Damascus, and, according to some accounts, Mecca, and ordered that all other variant copies of the Quran be destroyed. This was done everywhere except in Kufa, where some scholars argue that Ibn Masʿūd and his followers refused.


title: History of the Quran

text: The above quoted hadith refers to the manuscripts of the Quran compiled during the time of Caliph Abu Bakr, which were inherited by Caliph Umar's daughter Hafsa, a wife of Muhammad, and then returned to her, as promised. Sean Anthony and Catherine Bronson note that "Zuhrī—the earliest known scholar to emphasize the importance of Ḥafṣah’s codex for the collection of the caliph ʿUthmān’s recension—also serves as the authority for the accounts of the destruction of Ḥafṣah’s scrolls (ṣuḥuf)." After her death, he reported that Hafsa's brother inherited the manuscripts and allowed Uthman or according to some versions, Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan to destroy them.


title: History of the Quran

text: Beliefs of some Shia Muslim scholars about the origins of the Quran may differ in some respects from Sunni beliefs. According to influential Marja' Abu al-Qasim al-Khoei, Uthman's collection of the Quran was metaphorical, not physical. He did not collect the verses and suras in one volume, but in the sense that he united the Muslims on the reading of one authoritative recension. al-Khoei also argues that the one reading on which Uthman united the Muslims was the one in circulation among most Muslims, and that it reached them through uninterrupted transmission from Muhammad.


title: History of the Quran

text: This is one of the most contested issues and an area where many non-Muslim and Muslim scholars often clash.


title: History of the Quran

text: Some Shia scholars believe that Ali ibn Abi Talib possessed a personal apograph of the Quran, which he collected six months after Muhammad's death, and that this was the first compilation of the Quran. The unique aspect about this version is that it was collected in the order it was sent, which mainstream Shi'ites hold is the only difference between the Quran as known today and Ali's.


title: History of the Quran

text: A few Shia scholars argue that Ali presented his Quran to the community, but they refused to acknowledge his copy. One report states, "he had brought the complete Book [of God], comprising the interpretation and the revelation, the precise and ambiguous verses, the abrogating and the abrogated verses; nothing was missing from it, [not even] a letter "alif", nor "lam". But they did not accept it from him" They also believe that Ali's version of the Quran contained verses that are not seen in the Uthmanic codex we have today. They believe changes in the order of verses and suras did take place and that there were variant readings, "tabdil", exchange of words such as "umma" to "imma", rearrangement of words and deletion of words pertaining to the right of Ali being the first caliph.


title: History of the Quran

text: The contemporary Shia scholar Abu al-Qasim al-Khoei provides a counter argument to this belief. He states that even if Ali's Quran incorporated additions that are not part of the existing Quran, this does not mean that these additions comprised parts of the Quran and have been dropped from it due to alteration. Rather, these additions were interpretations or explanations of what God was saying, or were in the form of revelations from God, explaining the intention of the verses in the Quran. These additions are not part of the standard Quran and not considered part of what the Muslim Messenger of God was commanded to convey to his community.


title: History of the Quran

text: The origin of the Quran has been a subject of sustained academic research. There have also been a number of proposals for refinement of the traditional view and even its fundamental re-evaluation.


title: History of the Quran

text: Until around the 1970s, non-Muslim scholars—while not accepting the divinity of the Quran—did accept its Islamic origin story. Ernest Renan famously declared that "Islam was born, not amid the mystery which cradles the origins of other religions, but rather in the full light of history"—an empire ruling in the name of the religion of Islam and whose expansion was fuelled by religious fervor, and which presided over the compilation, editing, approving and distributing of the holy book of that religion (the Quran).


title: History of the Quran

text: But in the 1970s revisionist historians began to question Islamic "literary sources" — "tafsir" or commentaries on the Quran, "hadith," or accounts of what the Islamic prophet Muhammad approved of or didn't, and "sira," biography of the prophet — upon which the traditional account of the Quran were based. They employed a "source-critical" approach to this literature, including as evidence relevant archaeology, epigraphy, numismatics, and contemporary non-Arabic literature, that they argued provided "hard facts" and an ability to crosscheck.


title: History of the Quran

text: Islamic historians Patricia Crone, Michael Cook, John Wansbrough, and archaeologist Yehuda D. Nevo all argue that all the primary Islamic historical sources which exist are from 150 to 300 years after the events which they describe, leaving several generations for events to be forgotten, misinterpreted, distorted, garbled, etc. They contend that Islam was formed gradually over a number of centuries after the Muslim conquests, as the Islamic conquerors elaborated and backdated their beliefs and history in response to Jewish and Christian challenges.


title: History of the Quran

text: In 1999, Cook and Crone argued that "there is no hard evidence for the existence of the Koran in any form before the last decade of the seventh century." Partial Quranic manuscripts such as the Sanaa manuscript and the Birmingham Quran manuscript, which have been carbon-dated back to the early seventh century, were discovered later. However, Marijn van Putten, who has published work on idiosyncratic orthography common to all early manuscripts of the Uthmanic text type has stated and demonstrated with examples that due to a number of these same idiosyncratic spellings present in the Birmingham fragment (Mingana 1572a + Arabe 328c), it is "clearly a descendant of the Uthmanic text type" and that it is "impossible" that it is a pre-Uthmanic copy, despite its early radiocarbon dating.


title: History of the Quran

text: Author, journalist and scholar Toby Lester notes the Quran "assumes a familiarity with language, stories, and events that seem to have been lost even to the earliest of Muslim exegetes". Cook and Christopher Rose note the Quran contains obscure words and phrases, "mystery letters," or Muqattaʿat—groups of between one and four letters that do not form words and begin about one quarter of surahs of the Quran, and the Sabians religious group unknown to historians. Cook argue that "someone must once have known" what these mean, and that their meaning was forgotten now suggests the Quran may have been "off the scene for several decades".


title: History of the Quran

text: There is no mention of the "Quran" nor "Islam", nor "rightly guided caliphs", nor any of the famous "futūḥ" battles by Christian Byzantines in their historical records describing the Arab invaders advance, leaders or religion; the lack of any surviving documents by those Arabs who "lived through the establishment of the Caliphate"; the fact that coins of the region and era did not use Islamic iconography until sometime after 685 CE.


title: History of the Quran

text: According to tradition, the Quran was composed in the early 7th century CE, but according to historian Tom Holland, "only in the 690's did a Caliph finally get around to inscribing the Prophet's name on a public monument; only decades after that did the first tentative references to him start to appear in private inscriptions". The historian Stephen Shoemaker holds that the Quran did not reach its final compilation until the reign of Abd al-Malik (685-705 CE).


title: History of the Quran

text: Regarding the collection and editing of the Quran into a book ("Mus'haf"), historian Michael Cook writes that while there is "more or less" common ground among hadith, aka traditions that Muhammad did not do it but that this task was completed by the end of the reign of Caliph Uthman. Otherwise hadith do not agree:


title: History of the Quran

text: We learn that some of Muhammad's followers already knew the whole Quran by heart in his lifetime -- yet subsequently it had to pieced together out of fragments collected from here and there. We are told that Muhammad regularly dictated his revelations to a scribe -- yet the scripture was later in danger of being lost through the death in battle of those who had it by heart. It was collected and made into a book by the first Caliph; or by the second; or by the third, Uthman. Alternatively, it had already been collected before the time of Uthman, and he merely had the text standarised and other versions destroyed. The last of these traditions has tended to prevail, but the choice is a somewhat arbitrary one...


title: History of the Quran

text: The accounts of non-Muslim conquered peoples also conflict with the accounts of traditional Islamic literature. Examining 7th century Byzantine Christian sources commentary on the Arab "immigrants" ("Mhaggraye") who were invading and settling in formerly Byzantine territory at that time, historian Abdul-Massih Saadi found the Christians never mentioned the terms "Quran" nor "Islam" nor that the immigrants were of a new religion. They referred to the immigrants in ethnic terms -- "among them (Arabs) there are many Christians...". The Christians used secular or political, not religious terms (kings, princes, rulers) to refer to the Arab leaders. Muhammad was "the first king of the Mhaggraye", also guide, teacher, leader or great ruler. They did however mention the religion of the Arabs. The immigrants' religion was described as monotheist "in accordance with the Old Law (Old Testament)". When the Emir of the immigrants and Patriarch of the local Christians did have a religious colloquium there was much discussion of the scriptures but no mention of the Quran, "a possible indication that the Quran was not yet in circulation." The Christians reported the Emir was accompanied by "learned Jews", that the immigrants "accepted the Torah just as the Jews and Samaritans", though none of the sources described the immigrants as Jews.


title: History of the Quran

text: Wansbrough's students Crone and Cook co-authored a book called "" (1977). Crone, Wansbrough, and Nevo argue that all the primary sources which exist are from 150–300 years after the events which they describe, and thus are chronologically far removed from those events.


title: History of the Quran

text: Not all scholars question the sacred history of the Quran. Emran El-Badawi writes, "the opening chapters of Fred Donner's "Narratives of Islamic Origins: The Beginnings of Islamic Historical Writing" claims to refute the theoretical and methodological flaws of the skeptical school and instead dates the composition of the Quran, as a closed canon, to an Arabian context of early believers preceding ... the first civil war in 656." Donner's perspective now represents mainstream scholarly opinion.


title: History of the Quran

text: The datings in 2015 of the Birmingham Quran manuscript lead Joseph E. B. Lumbard, a convert to Islam and associate professor of Quranic studies at the College of Islamic Studies at Hamad Bin Khalifa University in Qatar, to comment:


title: History of the Quran

text: These recent empirical findings are of fundamental importance. They establish that as regards the broad outlines of the history of the compilation and codification of the Quranic text, the classical Islamic sources are far more reliable than had hitherto been assumed. Such findings thus render the vast majority of Western revisionist theories regarding the historical origins of the Quran untenable.


title: History of the Quran

text: However, on Birmingham manuscript, David Thomas pointed out that the radiocarbon testing found the death date of the animal whose skin made up the Quran, not the date when the Quran was written. Since blank parchment was often stored for years after being produced, he said the Quran could have been written as late as 650–655, during the Quranic codification under Uthman. And later, Marijn van Putten, who has published work on idiosyncratic orthography common to all early manuscripts of the Uthmanic text, stated that it can not be a pre-Uthmanic copy, despite its early radiocarbon dating.


title: History of the Quran

text: In dating of the text, the Dome of the Rock inscriptions, which have been known for over a century, are significant. The inner face of the octagon include the declaration of faith and verses describing the powers of God. Next Muhammad is introduced, with a blessing that, though uncited in the Quran, was already in use in 694. Then Christians are preached about the prophet-hood and mortality of Jesus, followed by the claim that God is sufficient unto Himself. At the end, people are commanded to bend to His will and punishment is threatened otherwise.


title: History of the Quran

text: The absence of contemporaneous corroborating material from the very first century of Islam has raised numerous questions as to the authenticity of the account provided by later traditionalist sources. All that is preserved from this time period are a few commemorative building inscriptions and assorted coins. However, some scholars deny such a belittlement of key sources from the era. Besides the Dome of the Rock inscriptions mentioned above, there are also brief Quranic passages on coins issued from the time of Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan (697-750). These passages include the shahadah, verses 112:1-3 or -4 complete except for the initial "basmallah" and the introductory word "say", and part of 9:33, but with some variations: "He sent him with the guidance and the Religion of Truth, that He may cause it to prevail over all religion..." Similar to the contemporary inscriptions at the Dome of the Rock these portions are clearly intended to declare the primacy of the new religion of Islam over Christianity, in particular.


title: History of the Quran

text: Skeptical scholars, nonetheless, point out that the earliest account of Muhammad's life by Ibn Ishaq was written about a century after Muhammad died and all later narratives by Islamic biographers contain far more details and embellishments about events which are entirely lacking in Ibn Ishaq's text.


title: History of the Quran

text: Patricia Crone, studying the origins of the Quran, has focused on the examination of the vast body of the Greek, Armenian, Hebrew, Aramaic, Syriac, and Coptic accounts of non-Muslim neighbours of the 7th and 8th centuries which in many cases contradict the traditional Islamic narratives. She argues that the consistency of the non-Muslim sources spread over a large geographic area would tend to rule out a non-Muslim anti-Islamic motive to these sources.


title: History of the Quran

text: The sceptic approach has been further expanded by Christoph Luxenberg, who supports claims for a late composition of the Quran, and traces much of it to sources other than Muhammad. Luxenberg is known for his thesis that the Quran is merely a re-working of an earlier Christian text, a Syriac lectionary. Gerd R. Puin, has similar views about Alexander the Great in the Quran.


title: History of the Quran

text: Fred Donner has argued for an early date for the collection of the Quran, based on his reading of the text itself. He points out that if the Quran had been collected over the tumultuous early centuries of Islam, with their vast conquests and expansion and bloody incidents between rivals for the caliphate, there would have been some evidence of this history in the text. However, there is nothing in the Quran that does not reflect what is known of the earliest Muslim community.


title: History of the Quran

text: In 1972, during the restoration of the Great Mosque of San'a in Yemen, labourers stumbled upon a "paper grave" containing tens of thousands of fragments of parchment on which verses of the Quran were written. Some of these fragments were believed to be the oldest Quranic texts yet found.


title: History of the Quran

text: The latest in origin of the Quran is the discovery of parchments of Quranic text by the University of Birmingham in 2015, the parchment material has been radiocarbon dated to the period between 568 and 645 with 95.4% accuracy. The test was carried out in a laboratory at the University of Oxford. The result places the parchment close to the time of Muhammad, who is generally thought to have lived between 570 and 632. Researchers conclude that the parchment is among the earliest written textual evidence of the Quran in existence. François Déroche of the Collège de France, however, expressed reservations about the reliability of the radiocarbon dates proposed for the Birmingham leaves, noting instances elsewhere in which radiocarbon dating had proved inaccurate in testing Qurans with an explicit endowment date. Mustafa Shah, Senior Lecturer in Islamic Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies, has suggested that the grammatical marks and verse separators in the Birmingham leaves are inconsistent with the proposed early radiocarbon dates.


title: History of the Quran

text: In the 1970s, what has been described as a "wave of sceptical scholars" challenged a great deal of the received wisdom in Islamic studies. They argued that the Islamic historical tradition had been greatly corrupted in transmission. They tried to correct or reconstruct the early history of Islam from other, presumably more reliable, sources such as coins, inscriptions, and non-Islamic sources. The oldest of this group was John Wansbrough (1928–2002). Wansbrough's works were widely noted, but perhaps not widely read. In 1972 a cache of ancient Qur'ans in a mosque in Sana'a, Yemen was discovered – commonly known as the Sana'a manuscripts. The German scholar Gerd R. Puin and his research team, who investigated these Quran fragments for many years, made approximately 35,000 microfilm photographs of the manuscripts, which he dated to early part of the 8th century. Puin has not published the entirety of his work, but noted unconventional verse orderings, minor textual variations, and rare styles of orthography. He also suggested that some of the parchments were palimpsests which had been reused. Puin believed that this implied an evolving text as opposed to a fixed one. Keith Small, in "Textual Criticism and Qur’ān Manuscripts", has concluded that it is not possible to develop a reliable critical text of the Quran based on the sources currently available. The Corpus Coranicum project is an ongoing effort to develop a critical edition of the Quran.


title: History of the Quran

text: Skeptical scholars account for the many similarities between the Quran and the Jewish and Hebrew Scriptures by saying that Muhammad was teaching what he believed to be a universal history, as he had heard it from the Jews and Christians he had encountered in Arabia and on his travels – as well as his exposure to the Hanif tradition by way of his paternal-grandfather, Abdul Muttalib. These scholars also disagree with the Islamic belief that the whole of the Quran is addressed by God to humankind. They note that there are numerous passages where God is directly addressed, or mentioned in the third person, or where the narrator swears by various entities, including God. The Quranic account, however, differs significantly regarding the crucifixion and death of Jesus.


title: History of the Quran

text: Aside from the Bible, Quran relies on several Apocryphal sources, like the Protoevangelium of James, Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew, and several infancy gospels. Several narratives rely on Jewish Midrash Tanhuma legends, like the narrative of Cain learning to bury the body of Abel in Surah 5:31.


title: History of the Quran

text: Before Uthman established the canon of the Quran, there may have been different versions or codices in complete state, though none has yet been discovered. Such codices as may exist never gained general approval and were viewed by Muslims as individuals' personal copies. With respect to partial codices, there is opinion that "the search for variants in the partial versions extant before the Caliph Uthman's alleged recension in the 640s has not yielded any differences of great significance". The two most influential codices at this time are ʿAbdullah ibn Masʿud's and Ubayy ibn Kaʿb's. Al-Qurazi recounted seeing the "mushafs" used by Ibn Mas'ud, Ubayy, and Zaid b. Thabit and finding no differences between them.


title: History of the Quran

text: The most influential of the allegedly varying codices was that of ʿAbdullah ibn Masʿud, an early convert who became a personal servant to Muhammad. It is reported that he learned around seventy suras directly from Muhammad, who appointed him as one of the first teachers of Quranic recitation. Later he was appointed to an administrative post in Kufa by the caliph ʿUmar, where he became a leading authority on the Quran and Sunnah. Some sources suggest that Ibn Masʿud refused to destroy his copy of the Quran or to stop teaching it when the ʿUthmanic codex was made official.


title: History of the Quran

text: There are two points on which Ibn Masʿud's version is alleged to differ from the ʿUthmanic text: the order of the suras and some variants in the readings. Muhammad Mustafa Al-A'zami lists three reports concerning the omission of three suras, (Al-Fatiha and Al-Mu'awwidhatayn, the two short suras with which the Quran ends (Suras 113 and 114)), he then states that "early scholars such as al-Nawawi and Ibn Hazm denounced these reports as lies fathered upon Ibn Mas'ud." Most of the other differences involve only altered vowels with the same consonantal text, which caused variations in recitation. Dr. Ramon Harvey notes that Ibn Masʿūd's reading continued in use, and was even taught as the dominant reading in Kufa for at least a century after his death, in a paper discussing how some of his distinctive readings continued to play a role in Hanafi fiqh.


title: History of the Quran

text: The second most influential codex was that of Ubay ibn Ka'b, a Medinan Muslim who served as a secretary for Muhammad. It is believed that he may have been more prominent as a Quranic specialist than Ibn Masʿud during Muḥammad's lifetime. There are reports that he was responsible for memorizing certain important revelations on legal matters, which from time to time Muhammad asked him to recite. In a few "hadiths", Ubay is seen in a variety of roles. For instance, the "sheets" of Ubay are sometimes mentioned in some instances instead of those of Ḥafsa, and sometimes he is also mentioned in some "hadiths" instead of Zayd, dictating the Quran to scribes.


title: History of the Quran

text: His version of the Quran is said to have included two short suras not in the Uthmanic or Ibn Masʿud texts: "Sūrat al-Khal", with three verses, and "Sūrat al-Ḥafd", with six. Professor Sean Anthony has discussed the textual history of these two surahs in detail and noted that their presence in mushafs modelled after Ubayy's (and to a lesser extent, certain other companions) is "robustly represented in our earliest and best sources". While we lack material evidence in the form of manuscripts, he notes that many of the Muslim sources make direct material observations of the surahs in such mushafs. The order of suras in Ubayy's codex is said to have differed from that of Uthman's and Ibn Masʿud's as well, although these are structural differences rather than textual variations. The surah order of the lower text of the early seventh century Ṣanʽā’ 1 palimpsest is known to have similarities with that reported of Ubayy (and to a lesser extent, that of Ibn Mas'ud).


title: History of the Quran

text: The first sura, entitled "al-Khal" ("separation"), is translated as: "O Allah, we seek your help and ask your forgiveness, and we praise you and we do not disbelieve in you. We separate from and leave him who sins against you."


title: History of the Quran

text: The second sura, entitled "al-Hafd" ("haste"), is translated as: "O Allah, we worship You and to You we pray and prostrate and to You we run and hasten to serve You. We hope for Your mercy and we fear Your punishment. Your punishment will certainly reach the disbelievers." These two pieces are said to constitute "qunut" (that is, supplications which Muhammad sometimes made in morning prayer or in "witr" prayer after recitation of suras from the Quran). They are in fact identical to some parts of "qunut" reported in the collections of "hadiths". (See Nawawi, "al-adhkar", Cairo, 1955, pp. 57–58.)


title: History of the Quran

text: The single additional so-called "aya" is translated: "If the son of Adam were given a valley full of riches, he would wish a second one; and if he were given two valleys full of riches, he would surely ask for a third. Nothing will fill the belly of the son of Adam except dust, and Allah is forgiving to him who is repentant." This text is known to be a "hadith" from Muhammad. (Bukhari, VIII, No. 444-47.) According to Ibn 'Abbas (No. 445) and 'Ubay (No. 446) this text was at times thought to be part of the Quran. However, Ubay himself clarifies that after sura 102: "I had been revealed, [the sahaba] did not consider the above to be part of the Quran." (Bukhari, VIII, No. 446.)


title: History of the Quran

text: This explanation of Ubay also makes it very clear that the companions of Mohammad did not differ at all about what was part of the Quran and what was not part of the Quran when the revelation had ceased. It is also important to note that the "hadith" appeared in the "mushaf" of Ubay because it was for his own personal use; that is, in his private notebook, where he did not always distinguish between Quranic material and "hadith", since the notebook was not meant for public use and he himself knew well what to make of his own notes. All companions of Mohammad are said to have had their own copies of the Quran, with notes, for personal use.


title: History of the Quran

text: The Islamic reports of these copies of the Quran of the companions of Mohammad only tell of various differences according to reports that reached them ("e.g.", the "hadith" in Bukhari, VIII, No. 446, that Ubay at some early stage held this sentence to be part of the Quran). However, the tangible manuscripts of these copies of the Quran have not survived but were destroyed, having been considered obsolete.


title: History of the Quran

text: After Uthman had the other codices destroyed there were still variations in the reading and the text of this Quran. However, scholars deny the possibility of great changes of the text arguing that addition, suppression or alteration would have led to controversy 'of which there is little trace'. They further state that even though Uthman became unpopular among Muslims, he was not charged with alteration or mutilation of the Quran in general.


title: History of the Quran

text: During the manuscript age, the Quran was the most copied Arabic text. It was believed that copying the Quran would bring blessings on the scribe and the owner.


title: History of the Quran

text: The Arabic script as we know it today was unknown in Muhammad's time (as Arabic writing styles have progressed through time) and the Quran was preserved through memorization and written references on different materials. As Arab society started to evolve into using writing more regularly, writing skills evolved accordingly. Early Quranic Arabic was written in a rasm which lacked precision because distinguishing between consonants was impossible due to the absence of diacritical marks ("a'jam"). Vowelling marks ("tashkil") to indicate prolongation or vowels were absent as well. Due to this there were endless possibilities for the mispronunciation of the word. The Arabic script as we know it today, the "scripta plena", which has pointed texts and is fully vowelled was not perfected until the middle of the 9th century.


title: History of the Quran

text: The earliest known manuscripts of the Quran are collectively called the Hijazi script, and are mostly associated with the Umayyad period.


title: History of the Quran

text: Most of the fundamental reform to the manuscripts of the Quran took place under Abd al-Malik, the fifth Umayyad caliph (65/685–86/705). Under Abd al-Malik's reign, Abu'l Aswad al-Du'ali (died 688) founded the Arabic grammar and invented the system of placing large coloured dots to indicate the tashkil. The Umayyad governor al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf al-Thaqafi later enforced this system.


title: History of the Quran

text: During this time the construction of the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem in 72/691–92 was done, which was complete with Quranic inscriptions. The inscriptions on the Dome of the Rock in fact represent the earliest known dated passages from the Quran. In these inscriptions, many letters are already provided with diacritical points.


title: History of the Quran

text: The earliest codices of the Quran found in the Umayyad period were most likely made in single volumes, which can be determined from the large fragments that have survived. Also during this time, the format of the codex went from being vertical to horizontal in the 8th century. It is believed this change to horizontal formats and thick/heavy-looking scripts may have been done to show the superiority of the Quran and to distinguish the Islamic tradition from the Jewish and Christian ones, who used vertical formats for their scriptures.


title: History of the Quran

text: During this time, there was a diversity of styles in which the Quran was written. One characteristic seen in most of these manuscripts is the elongated shafts of the free-standing alif and the right-sided tail (foot) of the isolated alif. Also, these manuscripts do not have headings of chapters (suras). Instead, a blank space is left at the end of one sura and at the beginning of another.


title: History of the Quran

text: Unlike the manuscripts from the Umayyad Dynasty, many of the early Abbasid manuscripts were copied in a number of volumes. This is evident from the large scripts used and the smaller number of lines per page. Early Quranic manuscripts provide evidence for the history of the Quranic text and their formal features tell us something about the way art and its deeper meaning were perceived in the classical age of Islam. Both its script and layout turned out to be constructed according to elaborate geometrical and proportional rules.


title: History of the Quran

text: The main characteristic of these scripts was their writing style. The letters in most of these manuscripts are heavy-looking, relatively short and horizontally elongated. The slanted isolated form of the alif that was present in the Umayyad period completely disappeared and was replaced by a straight shaft with a pronounced right-sided foot, set at a considerable distance from the following letter. Also, unlike the Hijazi scripts, these are often richly illuminated in gold and other colours. Another difference is that sura headings are clearly marked and enclosed in rectangular panels with marginal vignettes or palmettes protruding into the outer margins. These Qurans of the early Abbasid period were also bound in wooden boards, structured like a box enclosed on all sides with a movable upper cover that was fastened to the rest of the structure with leather thongs.


title: History of the Quran

text: The New Abbasid Style (NS) began at the end of the 9th century C.E. and was used for copying the Quran until the 12th centuries, and maybe even as late as the 13th century. Unlike manuscripts copied in Early Abbasid scripts, NS manuscripts had vertical formats.


title: History of the Quran

text: During this time, Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi (died 786) devised a tashkil system to replace that of Abu al-Aswad. His system has been universally used since the early 11th century, and includes six diacritical marks: fatha (a), damma (u), kasra (i), sukun (vowel-less), shadda (double consonant), madda (vowel prolongation; applied to the alif).


title: History of the Quran

text: Another central figure during this time was Abu Bakr b. Mujāhid (died 324/936). His goal was to restrict the number of reliable readings and accept only those based on a fairly uniform consonantal text. He chose seven well-known Quran teachers of the 2nd/8th century and declared that their readings all had divine authority, which the others lacked. He based this on the popular ḥadith in which Muhammad says the Quran was revealed to him in "seven aḥruf". During this time there was strong Quranic traditions in Kufa, Baṣra, Medina, Damascus, and Mecca. Due to this, Ibn Mujāhid selected one reading each for Medina, Mecca, Baṣra, and Damascus—those of Nafi‘ (died 169/785), Ibn Kathir (died 120/737), Abu ʿAmr (died 154/770), and IbnʿAmir (died 118/736), respectively—and three for Kūfa, those of ʿAsim (died 127/744), Ḥamza (died 156/772), and al-Kisaʾi (died 189/804). His attempt to limit the number of canonical readings to seven was not acceptable to all, and there was strong support for alternative readings in most of the five cities. In the present day the most common reading that is in general use is that of 'Aasim al-Kufi through Hafs.


title: History of the Quran

text: The 11th-century eastern Quranic manuscript contains the 20th juz' (section) of a Quran that originally consisted of 30 parts. The arrangement into 30 parts corresponds to the number of days in the month of Ramadan, during which the Muslim is obliged to fast and to read through the whole of the Quran. Other sections or fragments of this magnificent manuscript lie scattered in various collections all over the world. A Turkish note ascribes the Quran to the hand of the Caliph Ali, Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law, and thus demonstrates the high significance of this manuscript. The text is written in Eastern Kufic, a monumental script that was developed in Iran in the late 10th century. The writing and the illumination of the manuscript bear witness to the great artistic skills of the calligrapher and the illustrator. The manuscript is at the Bavarian State Library in Munich, Germany. Out of seven complete or nearly complete semi-Kufic Qurans from before the end of the eleventh century, four contain a verse count. Although a small sample, it does suggest that the use of a verse count was a prevalent and quite deeply rooted practice in semi-Kufic Qurans between ca. 950 and ca. 1100.


title: History of the Quran

text: Abu Ali Muhammad ibn Muqla (died 940), an accomplished calligrapher from Baghdad, was also a prominent figure at this time. He became vizir to three Abbasid caliphs and is credited with developing the first script to obey strict proportional rules. Ibn Muqla's system was used in the development and standardization of the Quranic script, and his calligraphic work became the standard way of writing the Quran. However it was later perfected by Ibn al-Bawwab (d. 1022), the master calligrapher who continued Muqla's tradition. Muqla's system became one of the most popular styles for transcribing Arabic manuscripts in general, being favoured for its legibility. The eleventh century Quran is one of the earliest dated manuscripts in this style.


title: History of the Quran

text: This "new style" is defined by breaks and angular forms and by extreme contrasts between the thick and thin strokes. The script was initially used in administrative and legal documents, but then it replaced earlier Quranic scripts. It is possible that it was easier to read than the early 'Abbasid scripts, which differ greatly from current writing. Economic factors may also have played a part because while the "new style" was being introduced, paper was also beginning to spread throughout the Muslim world, and the decrease in the price of books triggered by the introduction of this new material seems to have led to an increase in its demand. The "new style" was the last script to spread throughout the Muslim world before the introduction of printing. It remained in use until the 13th century, at which point it was restricted to titles only.


title: History of the Quran

text: The influential standard Quran of Cairo ("1342 Cairo text" using the Islamic calendar) is the Quran that was used throughout almost all the Muslim world until the Saudi Quran of 1985. The Egyptian edition is based on the "Ḥafṣ" version ("qira'at") based on ʻAsim's recitation, the 8th-century recitation of Kufa. ۞ It uses a set of additional symbols and an elaborate system of modified vowel-signs and for minute details, not identical to any older system. The Cairo edition has become the standard for modern printings of the Quran with the exception of those used in all North Africa (excluding Egypt) where the Warsh version is used.


title: History of the Quran

text: A committee of leading professors from Al-Azhar University had started work on the project in 1907 but it was not until 10 July 1924 that the "Cairo Qur’an" was first published by Amiri Press under the patronage of Fuad I of Egypt, as such, it is sometimes known as the "royal ("amīriyya") edition." The goal of the government of the newly formed Kingdom of Egypt was not to delegitimize the other qir’at, but to eliminate that, which the colophon labels as errors, found in Qur’anic texts used in state schools. To do this they chose to preserve one of the fourteen Qira'at “readings”, namely that of Hafs (d. 180/796), student of ‘Asim. Its publication has been called a "terrific success", and the edition has been described as one "now widely seen as the official text of the Qur’an", so popular among both Sunni and Shi'a that the common belief among less well-informed Muslims is "that the Qur’an has a single, unambiguous reading", i.e. that of the 1924 Cairo version. Minor amendments were made later in 1924 and in 1936 - the "Faruq edition" in honour of then ruler, King Faruq.


title: History of the Quran

text: Reasons given for the overwhelming popularity of Hafs and Asim range from the fact that it is easy to recite, to the simple statement that "God has chosen it". Ingrid Mattson credits mass-produced printing press mushafs with increasing the availability of the written Quran but also diminishing the diversity of qira'at. Written text has become canonical and oral recitation has lost much of its previous equality.


title: History of the Quran

text: Muslim disagreement over whether to include the Basmala within the Quranic text, reached consensus following the 1924 Edition, which included it as the first verse ("āyah") of Quran chapter 1 but otherwise included it as an unnumbered line of text preceding the other 113 chapters. The Cairo Quran adopted the Kufan tradition of separating and numbering verses, and thus standardized a different verse numbering to Flügel's 1834 edition. It adopted the chronological order of chapters attributed to Ibn Abbās, which became widely accepted following 1924. A large number of pre-1924 Qurans were destroyed by dumping them in the river Nile.


title: History of the Quran

text: Prominent committee members included Islamic scholar, Muhammad b. ‘Ali al-Husayni al-Haddad, Egypt's senior Qur'an Reader ("Shaykh al-Maqâri"). Noteworthy Western scholars/academics working in Egypt during the era include Bergsträsser and Jeffery. Methodological differences aside, speculation alludes to a spirit of cooperation. Bergsträsser was certainly impressed with the work.


title: History of the Quran

text: According to Islamic sources before Caliph Uthman's standardization, after which variants were burned, the Quran may have contained either 116 chapters (Ubayy Ibn Ka'ab's codex) or 111 chapters (Ibn Ma'sud's codex).


title: History of the Quran

text: Most Muslims believe that Quran, as it is presented today, is complete and untouched, supported by their faith in Quranic verses such as "We [Allah] have, without doubt, sent down the Reminder [the Quran]; and We will assuredly guard it [from corruption]".


title: History of the Quran

text: Due to the varying accounts and hadiths on the collection and canonization of the Quran, some scholars debate whether the Uthmanic text contains the entire body of material that was revealed to Muhammad, or if there is material missing from the text. For example, some Sunni literature contains reports that suggest that some of the revelations had already been lost before the collection of the Quran initiated by Abu Bakr. In one report, 'Umar was once looking for the text of a specific verse of the Quran on stoning as a punishment for adultery, which he remembered. Later, he discovered that the only person who had any record of that verse had been killed in the battle of Yamama and as a result the verse was lost. Some of the Companions recalled that same verse, one person being 'A'isha, Muhammad's youngest wife. She is believed to have said that a sheet on which two verses, including the one on stoning, were under her bedding and that after Muhammad died, a domestic animal got into the room and ate the sheet. Experts on hadith literature have rejected this hadith, as all routes of transmission either contain narrators charged with dishonesty in disclosing sources or simply conflict with the majority version of the report, which all have authentic routes of transmission but omit the part about the piece of paper being eaten.


title: History of the Quran

text: Certain Shia scholars state that Ali's predecessors wilfully excluded all references to the right of Ali to be the caliph after Muhammad died. Some Shias questioned the integrity of the Uthmanic codex, stating that two surahs, ""al-Nurayn"" (The Two Lights) and ""al-Walayah"" (the Guardianship), which dealt with the virtues of Muhammad's family, were removed.


title: History of the Quran

text: Al-Khoei addresses this issue and argues for the authenticity and completeness of the Quran on the basis that it was compiled during the lifetime of Muhammad. His argument is based on hadiths and on critically analysing the situation during and after the life of Muhammad. He states that the collection of the Quran by Abu Bakr, Umar, and Uthman occurred significantly after the caliphate was decided, and so if Ali's rule had been mentioned, there would have been no need for the Muslims to gather to appoint someone. The fact that none of the Companions mentioned this supposed alteration, either at the beginning of the caliphate or after Ali became caliph, is regarded as proof that this alteration did not occur.


title: History of the Quran

text: Al-Khoei also argues that by the time 'Uthman became caliph, Islam had spread to such an extent that it was impossible for anyone to remove anything from the Quran. Uthman could have altered the text but he would have been unable to convince all those who had memorized the Quran to go along with his alterations. Any such alteration also would have been mentioned by Uthman's political opponents and assassins yet none accused him of this. Finally, he argues that if Uthman had altered the Quran, Ali would have restored it to its original state upon the death of Uthman, especially if verses of his rule had been removed. Instead Ali is seen promoting the Quran during his reign, which is evidence that there was no alteration.


title: History of the Quran

text: In the 20th century, the Sanaa manuscript was discovered. It has been radiocarbon dated to the range 578-669 CE with 95% confidence. The manuscript is a palimpsest with quranic verses in both upper and lower texts. The upper text has exactly the same verses and the same order of suras and verses as the standard Quran. The order of the suras in the lower text of the Sana'a codex is different from the order in the standard Quran. In addition, the lower text exhibits extensive variations from the counterpart text in the standard Quran; such that the lower text represents the only surviving early quranic manuscript that does not conform to the 'Uthmanic tradition. The majority of these variations add words and phrases, so as to emphasize or clarify the standard quranic reading. Some scholars have proposed parallels for these variations in reports of variants in 'companion codices' that were kept by individual companions to the Prophet outside of the mainstream tradition of 'Uthman; but these correspondences are much the minority. François Déroche proposes, on palaeographic grounds, a date for the lower text in the second half of the first century AH (hence 672 - 722 CE) and summarises the character of the Sana'a Palimpsest, "The scriptio inferior of the Codex Ṣanʿāʾ I has been transcribed in a milieu which adhered to a text of the Qurʾan different from the ʿUthmanic tradition as well as from the Qurʾanic codices of Ibn Masʿūd and Ubayy".


title: Egregore

text: Egregore (also spelled egregor; , ) is an occult concept representing a non-physical entity that arises from the collective thoughts of a distinct group of people. Historically, the concept referred to angelic beings, or watchers, and the specific rituals and practices associated with them, namely within Enochian traditions.


title: Egregore

text: In more recent times, the concept has referred to a psychic manifestation, or a thoughtform, which occurs when any group shares a common motivation—being made up of, and influencing, the thoughts of the group. The symbiotic relationship between an egregore and its group has been compared to the non-occult concepts of the corporation (as a juridical person or legal entity) and the meme.


title: Egregore

text: Later the term and concept found its way into other languages. "Manuscrit trouvé à Saragosse", or "The Manuscript Found in Saragossa", was a novel written in French by the Polish author Count Jan Potocki (1761–1815) in the Russian Empire in the early 19th century which features the term 'egregores', referring to "the most illustrious of fallen angels."