The Updated Count of the Quranic initials ALMR and ALMS in Quran

Summary: This is a study of the total count of the Quranic initials, ALMR and ALMS in the Quran using both manual count as well as a computer assisted count, of the Quran written in a text format and corrected to the Uthmani method of writing. Our study showed that the total count of both the ALMR and the ALMS initials which top suras 13 and 7 respectively is a multiple of 19 and follows the pattern of the Mathematical Miracle of the Quran.. Our study also confirmed some human errors in the orthography (Rasm) of some words in the modern edition of the Qurans, Hafs Mus-haf, when the rules of this research is applied. These words have to be corrected using the latest tool given to us by God Almighty, the mathematical miracle of the Quran. The proofs of the reason to correct each of these words are explained herein.

Materials and Method:

If you already read our article The count of the Quranic initial ALM and ALR in the Quran. you may go directly to our section about results, otherwise keep reading.

The Quran is characterized by a unique phenomenon never found in any other book; 29 suras are prefixed with 14 different sets of "Quranic Initials," consisting of one to five letters per set. Fourteen letters, half the Arabic alphabet, participate in these initials. The significance of the Quranic initials remained a divinely guarded secret for 14 centuries.

The Quran states in 10:20 and 25:4-6 that its miracle, i.e., proof of divine authorship, was destined to remain secret for a specific predetermined interim:

The Quranic Initials constitute a major portion of the Quran's 19-based. mathematical miracle. These initials include, ALM, ALR, ALMR, ALMS,Q, KHY'AS, S, YS, TH, TSM ,TS, HM, HM, 'ASQ and NUN. For easy references, we used the English alphabet in place of the Arabic ones, e.g. for the Alif (Alef) , we used "A", for the Lam, we used "L", for the Meem, we used "M", for the Reh, we used "R" , for the Sad, we used the bold "S"....etc.

Our study of the Quranic initials, that has the letter Alif in it, started when it was brought to our attention that the count of the Arabic letter Alif, in the suras initialed with Alif, has been disputed and reported differently by different researchers. These different counts reflect the difficulty in counting the Arabic alphabet Alif, and the disagreement over its writing , orthography (Rasm), its inclusion or exclusion. The Arabic alphabet Alif is also the most distorted alphabet when examined in different editions of the Quran as some scholars gave to themselves the liberty to add, delete or modify the writing of the alif. We, however, know that God promised to preserve the Quran (not the Mus-haf, the ink and paper). God therefore deliberately gave us the possession of many editions of the Quran including some of the oldest written Qurans and also gave us a tool to test and check these editions, the Mathematical Miracle of the Quran. It was definitely God's plan that the review of the letter Alif happens after the mathematical miracle has already been established and proved without the need for any single alphabet. This was a mean for God to give us the correction tool to the many human errors seen in the different editions of the Quran circulating today and to achieve what He promised of preserving the Quran as the one in the Master Tablets, (85:21-22). This tool, the mathematical miracle, will always be available to test and check any edition of the Quran, new or old. It is therefore clear that our work today represents what is seen in what we can call the everyday editions of the Quran. Further research and study supported by proofs, is expected , encouraged and welcome.

We also need to emphasize that neither the Quran nor its miracle are accessible to the disbelievers or idol-worshipers. It is God's system that they are blocked from seeing the truth as they chose not to believe or to associate others with God already.

Our findings will continue to disturb those who cannot see the miracle of the Quran, or those who abuse the miracle or miss the meaning or the message of the Quran, just as the previous verses promise.

We, recently, have obtained the Quran written in text format for our computer study, however, the text format did not follow the Uthmani orthography (Rasm) and therefore cannot be used to count the Quranic initials as such. We decided to correct the computer Arabic text format of the Quran that we obtained into the Uthmani Rasm (Orthography). We used the standard Hafs edition taken after the 1918 edition of the Quran in Cairo Egypt and later by King Fahd edition in Saudi Arabia. For the manual count we used a copy of King Fahd edition and also used for cross-reference seven other editions of the Quran printed in Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia, all of them according to Hafs. We also had to check on some words in question by using the images of the Gold Koran, one of the oldest available copies of the Quran, at The Sheridan Libraries , The Johns Hopkins University , Baltimore, Maryland , at their site; http://goldkoran.mse.jhu.edu/

After the correction of the computer text file, we counted the letter Alif using the computer and also using manual count to compare the counts. We have realized that some of the Uthmani Rasm of certain letters was not available yet for the computer program we were using but we were able to substitute it with the same letters although in a different font. For this reason all the hamzas written on an extension (madda), e.g. , we replaced them with a free standing hamza. We also changed the different forms of Alifs into one alif to facilitate the count and avoid mistakes. If a program is using the Unicode for the Arabic alphabets, no change in the forms of ALif or hamza will be needed except probably for the hamzas on madda (extension).. Until we get the correct font and activated Unicode for these letters, we will continue to use the regular font that is still available to all of those who use the computer and Arabic fonts. We have posted the Arabic text we used for the count on our site as part of Quran Inspector. To achieve the best visual comparison of the verses and to facilitate the manual count, we pasted the image of each verse taken from the Hafs edition of King Fahd Mus-haf below its respective computer text when we corrected the computer text and when we did our manual count. We used color codes of the alphabets to make the visual presentation easier for the eye for manual count.

Counting the Alifs also include counting the letter Hamza that is used many times as alif as will be shown later. The letter Alif in Arabic can be seen in many shapes:

Hamza is unique in Arabic in many respects. It takes one of four forms: distinctly pronounced, lightened, changed, or deleted altogether. These different ways are observed in readings of the Quran and the various Arab dialects. In the writing of the hamza itself, Quranic and normal orthography are similar in many ways. In some aspects, however, Quranic rasm differs, as Quran has its unique way that is meant to preserve the mathematical structure built in its Rasm (Orthography). Hamza can be used as a yaa or a waw as well as an alif. All the hamzas that are standing free in a word and the Hamzas written on an extension of a letter (Madda) are counted as alifs.

standing free Hamzas like: , , ,

Hamzas written on an extension of a letter: , , , ,

Hamzas written on a stem (Nabra), or under a stem is counted as a yaa. For example:

, , , ,

Hamzas written on a Lam Alif , in words where the alif is actually a hamza and an alif, is the most deceiving as it looks like two alifs but actually it is three alifs (two alifs and a hamza) for example , . If you look carefully at these words you will notice the insistence of the scribes to write the Hamza in these words between the Lam and the alif . Compare these words with other words that only has lam alif as in , where there is only one lam and one alif , the hamza is specially positioned on top of the alif.

Hamza written on a yaa is counted as a yaa, as in , . Hamza written on a waw is counted as a waw as in:

We used the same system and consistency in counting the Alifs (and Hamzas) in all the suras that start with the initials ALM and the ALR. We felt that all the suras that have the same initials are related and form one group related to one another. We used the computer also to count the letters Lam , Meem and Reh.

Some of the readers of this article may find it helpful to read our short article about "How to count the Quranic initials". Other related articles that may help understand this topic include, "Are all the Arabic versions of the Quran the same ?" and also, "Preserving and protecting the Quran"

Results:

We first counted the alifs of sura 13 which starts with the initial ALMR. Then we studied the count of sura 7 which starts with the initial ALMS. We also studied the several editions of the Quran we have that is printed in Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia , Turkey, as well as the Gold Koran, one of the oldest available copies of the Quran, at The Sheridan Libraries , The Johns Hopkins University , Baltimore, Maryland , at their site; http://goldkoran.mse.jhu.edu/

Our study of the new and old Quran confirmed the presence of human errors in the writing of three words in sura 13 as well as in seven words in sura 7 and to these we applied the strict rules of our research which we explained in our discussion in this article. The following is the tables of the count we obtained for sura 13 and sura 7 after the correction made to the human errors.

The raw count of the alifs in the new editions of the Qurans and before any correction, was found to be 609, of these there were 50 hamzas and 559 alifs.

The initial ALMS total has also been found to be a multiple of 19 when we correct the human (scribe error) in the orthography of the identified 7 words in the Egyptian edition and King Fahd edition of the Arabic Quran. We will explain the proof for this conclusion in the discussion section to follow. See table 2.

The raw count of the alifs in the new edition of the Qurans and before any correction was found to be 2521, of these there were 174 hamzas and 2347 alifs.

As for those interested in the number of Hamzas in every of these suras, we include table 3 to help those searching this issue;

Discussion

It has been a great promise by God Almighty to preserve the Quran, see 15:9. The the majority of the Muslims, however, misled by many scholars, were made to believe that verse 15:9 means God will preserve and protect the Mus-haf, the human written book, ink and papers. This is not what God promised to preserve in 15:9. He promised to preserve the Quran that He revealed to prophet Muhammed. The Mus-haf is no more than the human writing or collection of the Quran in books, papers, papyri, bones, palm leaves....etc and is not the handwriting of God. We are all aware that Uthman, the third Khalifa in the Islamic history, gathered his scribes and ordered them to collect the Quran that was already written during the prophet's life into one book. They did just that. They wrote several copies. The writers were no more than human beings and made numerous human errors in their writing that can be witnessed until this day. They can be seen in what is left and believed to be either Uthman Mus-haf or copies of it. {Please review our article about Human errors in the early writings of the Quran. } These human errors became obvious and clear for those who memorized the Quran when the re-writing of the Quran was needed to improve its Rasm (Orthography). This improved orthography was needed to facilitate its reading specially for the new generations of the Arabic speaking Muslims. Memorizing the Quran was an essential mean that God used to preserve the Quran in addition to its writing from the first day of revelation. It was God's plan that the Quran will be transmitted from Muhammed to all the generations to come through the oral transmission as well as the written word until the day comes when we, the humans advance enough to allow for a fixed and standardized editions that can easily be maintained and protected. This plan also involved achieving this progress around the time when the computer technology would dominate the world and become essential part in spreading God's message. It was not until the year 1918 in Cairo, Egypt when the Muslim scholars finally used what they considered their best judgment in writing the Quran in the best orthography format fit for the time. They used the orally transmitted Quran in comparison with the oldest available copies of the Quran to produce what is now the standard text of the modern Arabic Quran. In that edition they depended on the oral transmission and the written script together to correct any apparent scribes' errors or contradiction between the oral and written materials. It was God's plan that from this edition the great miracle of the Quran, the Mathematical Miracle, will be discovered, and can be seen and appreciated. The miracle itself was a sign that the Quran as it was transmitted and written at that time is what God gave to prophet Muhammed . It also shows that even when the Quran was written in its modern Arabic text it was under guidance from God Almighty.

The promise of God in 15:9 has to have a method to verify it. This method was revealed in 1974 when the mathematical miracle of the Quran that is based on number 19 which is mentioned in sura74 was discovered. This happened 1406 years after the revelation of the Quran (1406 = 19 X 74.) This protection can now, and to the end of the world, be confirmed by the mathematical structure of the Quran. That structure is what God described in 74:30-31 and called it; "One of the great miracles" in 74:35. This mathematical structure that was proven through hundreds of interlocking mathematical relations throughout the Quran has already proved the preservation of the Quran and exposed clearly the human errors in the writing of the early scribes. This was best shown by exposing the two false verses in the Quran that were human addition and have been suspected as false from the time of the writing of the Quran, verses, 9:128, 129.

The Arabic letter "Alif" had specially been subjected to many changes in different editions of the Quran as we can see if we review some f the old or new editions. The scribes of the Quran, being like all other humans, subject to errors, chose many times to change an alif by writing it or deleting it while unaware of its mathematical significance. This resulted in different number of counts in different editions of the Quran by different researchers. We however used the current King Fahd editions and made special cross reference with the Egyptian and Syrian editions and the oldest available Quran.We also have the advantage of knowing of the existence of the mathematical structure in the Quran that can be seen in hundreds of other proofs un-related to the initial "Alif:" and which is strongly proven without the need for the count of the "Alif" itself.

We applied three significant rules to the counted initial when there is a disagreement among the different editions of the Mus-haf. For a word to be considered a human error in any of the new editions and then corrected, it has to pass these three strict criteria, all of them and in this order;

1. The orthography of the written word in the new edition of the Quran should differ from the orthography of the same word as written in the oldest copy of the Quran in its exact specific location.
2. The orthography of the written word in its suspected form, in the new edition of the Quran, should differ from the orthography of the same word written in other verses and suras of the same new edition of the Quran, unless the word is not repeated anywhere else in the rest of the Quran..
3. The correction of the written word in the new edition after meeting the first two criteria will then correct any disturbance of the mathematical structure of the Quran based on number 19 as it has been proved by other initials, words, numbers and orders in the Quran.

Any one or two of these three criteria was not considered enough reason to consider a written word a human error that need to be corrected.

Sura 13, ALMR

During our count of the Alifs in suras 13 that starts with the initials ALMR we encountered several words that differ in their orthography in the Gold Koran from the new editions of the Quran by having either an extra alif or less alif, but of all these words only four words with five alifs (one of them repeated twice) were found to follow exactly the above three criteria and easily detected as human errors by the writers of the new editions of the Quran. These four words were found in verses 4, 5 , 14 and 17. These words are, , , and . Once these words are corrected to their original correct writing, the total count of the alif becomes 605 and the total of the ALMR becomes 1482 which is 19 X 78.

Below is a production of the verses and words in question and their correction.

Verse 13:4 as it appears in the new editions of the Quran;

Verse 13:4 as it appears in the Old Gold Koran with the words to be corrected marked;

The word is not used in any other place in the Quran but sura 13 verse 4.

Verse 13:5 as it appears in the new editions of the Quran;

Verse 13:5 as it appears in the Old Gold Koran with the word to be corrected marked;

The same word, , used in the correct form in verse 71 of sura 40 in the new edition of the same Quran.

Verse 13:14 as it appears in the new editions of the Quran. Remember that the hamza on top of waw is not counted as alif;

Verse 13:14 as it appears in the Old Gold Koran with the word to be corrected marked;

As you can clearly see the difference in the writing of the word "Du'aa" as it is written in the old Quran compared with the its writing in the new Qurans in 13:14 . This writing in 13:14 also disagrees with the same word as it is written in verse 50 of sura 40 in the same new Qurans .

Here is verse 50 of sura 40 as it appears in the Qurans today. Notice the writing of the word "Du'aa" .

Verse 13:17 as it appears in the new editions of the Quran. Notice how the word "al-amthal" is written with an extra alif when compared with the old Gold Koran.

Verse 13:17 as it appears in the Old Gold Koran with the word to be corrected marked; with no alif in the middle of the word

The same word in question is written in other suras of the Quran with an alif in 4 places and without alif in 6 places in addition to the one in 13:17.

Here is verse 25:5 as an example showing how the word is written without alif in the middle.

Sura 7, ALMS

During our count of the Alifs in suras 7 that starts with the initials ALMS we encountered several words that differ in their orthography (Rasm) in the Gold Koran from the new editions of the Quran by having either an extra alif or less alif, but of all these words only 7 words with eleven alifs in them (some of the words are repeated) were found to follow exactly the above three criteria and easily detected as human errors by the writers of the new editions of the Quran. These 7 words were found in verses 7:38,46,48,66,67,133,145,150,154 and 7:163. These words are shown in the following table. Once these words are corrected to their original correct writing, the total count of the alif becomes 2510 and the total of the ALMS becomes 5301 which is 19 X 279.

Images of the Old Gold Koran that show the above words.

7:38

7:46-48

7:66-68

7:133

7:150

7:154

7:163

In addition to the problem with the alif in sura 7, there was also one problem that was discussed by other authors regarding the letter Sad in 7:69. In the original Old Uthmani Quran (Tashkent), the word "bastatan" was originally written with the letter Seen not the letter Sad and this has to be corrected as well.

In the ‘original’ (Tashkent Quran) of 7:69 there is a seen whereas in the modern versions the word has sad

Conclusion:

The count of the initial ALMR , and the initial ALMS in the suras that start with these initials, i.e. sura 13 and sura 7, is respectively presented. These initials follow the system of the other 19 based mathematical miracle of the Quran.

The initials, ALMR prefix sura 13, and the total frequency of occurrence of the four letters is 1482, or 19x78. The letter "A" occurs 605 times, "L" occurs 480 times, "M" occurs 260 times, and "R" occurs 137 times.

The initials, ALMS prefix sura 7, and the letter "A" occurs in this sura 2510 times, "L" occurs 1530 times, "M" occurs 1164 times, and "S" (Saad) occurs 97 times. Thus, the total occurrence of the four letters in this sura is 2510+1530+1164+97 = 5301 = 19x279.

Again, our study supports the understanding that the Hafs writing of the Quran , despite the few human errors reported in it, is the best representation of the original Mus-haf as it represents the intact mathematical miracle of the Quran. We also found that the mathematical miracle of the Quran can be used and should be used as an excellent tool to verify or correct human errors in future or past writing of the Mus-haf.

"Over it is 19". 74:30

See also; The Updated Count of the Quranic initial ALM and ALR in the Quran.

The Arabic text we used for the count has been posted on our site as part of Quran Inspector.

References:

1. The Authorized English translation of Quran by Rashad Khalifa, Ph.D.
2. The Mathematical Miracle of Quran
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