The Quran in the World : A History of Islam's Sacred Book

The fascinating story of the Quran—how it became the book it is today and how Muslim views of it have evolved over the past 1,400 yearsThe Quran, like most great books, has a history. It went from a largely oral recitation in a region with limited writing and literacy to being the centerpiece of an extraordinary literary and intellectual culture, not only in theology and law but also poetry, prose, and art. In The Quran in the World, Bruce Fudge presents a new history of Islam’s sacred book and how it has been used, shaped, and interpreted from its origin in seventh-century Arabia to today. The Quran in the World describes how the Quran was put in writing and made into a book, and how Muslim scholars determined how it should be written and recited. It recounts how they developed sophisticated ways of analyzing its language and meanings, how they came to understand it as the “Word of God,” and how Muslims began to see it as an aesthetic miracle, a literary masterpiece no human could have produced. The book also charts Western Europe’s engagement with the Quran, from the first Latin translation in the twelfth century through the Reformation and Enlightenment. In the modern period, The Quran in the World chronicles Islamic debates about printing and translating the Quran, and its use by Muslim and non-Muslim poets and novelists. The book concludes by tracing how modernity and colonialism challenged traditional understandings of the Quran—and how Muslim thinkers responded. Vivid and accessible, The Quran in the World is a compelling account of the dramatic, eventful, and colorful history of the sacred book of Islam.