Editing Oral tradition (section)

===Islam===
The most recent of the world's major religions,<ref name="EMONT-why">{{cite journal |last1=EMONT |first1=Jon |title=Why Are There No New Major Religions? |journal=Atlantic |date=6 August 2017 |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/08/new-religions/533745/ |access-date=10 July 2019 |archive-date=10 July 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190710025159/https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/08/new-religions/533745/ |url-status=live }}</ref> [[Islam]] claims two major sources of divine revelation—the [[Quran]] and [[hadith]]—compiled in written form relatively shortly after being revealed:<ref name="Carroll-Q-H">{{cite web |last1=Carroll |first1=Jill |title=The Quran & Hadith |url=https://www.world-religions-professor.com/quran.html |website=World Religions |access-date=10 July 2019 |archive-date=20 February 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220220092934/https://www.world-religions-professor.com/quran.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
*The [[Quran]]—meaning "recitation" in Arabic—is believed by Muslims to be God's revelation to the Islamic prophet [[Muhammad]], delivered to him from 610 CE until his death in 632 CE. It is said to have been carefully compiled and edited into a standardized written form (known as the {{transliteration|ar|[[mushaf]]}}){{#tag:ref|"During Abu Bakr's khalifate, at Omar's suggestion, all the pieces of the Qur'an were compiled in one place. It was a miscellaneous collection at first, because then the revelations were coming in, people recorded them on anything that came to hand -- a sheet of parchment, a piece of leather, a stone, a bone, whatever. As khalifa, Omar began a sorting process. In his presence, each written verse was checked against the memorized version kept by the professional reciters whom this society regarded as the most reliable keepers of information. Scribes then recorded the authorized copy of each verse before witnesses, and these verse were organized into one comprehensive collection."<ref>{{cite book |author=Tamim Ansary |title=Destiny Disrupted, a History of the World Through Islamic Eyes |url=https://archive.org/details/destinydisrupted00ansa_0 |url-access=registration |publisher=Public Affairs |year=2009|isbn=9781586486068 }}</ref>|group=Note}} about two decades after the last verse was revealed.
*[[Hadith]]—meaning "narrative" or "report" in Arabic—is the record of the words, actions, and the silent approval, of Muhammad, and was transmitted by "oral preachers and storytellers" for around 150–250 years. Each hadith includes the {{transliteration|ar|[[isnad]]}} (chain of human transmitters who passed down the tradition before it was sorted according to accuracy, compiled, and committed to written form by a reputable scholar.{{#tag:ref|Muhammad is thought to have died in 632 CE. The compilers of the six collections of Sunni hadith that have enjoyed near-universal acceptance as part of the official canon of Sunni Islam died (that is, must have stopped compiling hadith) between 795 CE and 915 CE.|group=Note}}

The oral milieu in which the sources were revealed,<ref name=AGBRtT2014:2/> and their oral form in general are important.<ref name="QP"/> The [[Arabic epic literature|Arab poetry]] that preceded the Quran and the hadith were orally transmitted.<ref name=AGBRtT2014:2>[[#AGBRtT2014|Bannister, "Retelling the Tale", 2014]]: p.2</ref> Few Arabs were literate at the time and paper was not available in the Middle East.<ref>Michael Zwettler, The Oral Tradition of Classical Arabic Poetry, Ohio State Press, 1978, p.14.</ref><ref name=arab-news-27-2-2015/>

The written Quran is said to have been created in part through memorization by [[Companions of the Prophet|Muhammad's companions]], and the decision to create a standard written work is said to have come after the death in battle ([[Battle of Yamama|Yamama]]) of a large number of Muslims who had memorized the work.<ref name="QP">{{cite web |title=Quran Project - Appendix - Preservation and Literary Challenge of the Quran |url=https://www.quranproject.org/Quran-Project-Appendix-Preservation-and-Literary-Challenge-of-the-Quran--224-d |website=Quran Project |date=26 February 2015 |access-date=10 July 2019 |archive-date=21 June 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190621200307/http://www.quranproject.org/Quran-Project-Appendix-Preservation-and-Literary-Challenge-of-the-Quran--224-d |url-status=live }}</ref>

For centuries, copies of the Qurans were transcribed by hand, not printed, and their scarcity and expense made reciting the Quran from memory, not reading, the predominant mode of teaching it to others.<ref name=arab-news-27-2-2015/> To this day the Quran is memorized by millions and its recitation can be heard throughout the Muslim world from recordings and mosque loudspeakers (during [[Ramadan]]).<ref name=arab-news-27-2-2015/><ref>{{cite web |last1=Abu Zakariya |title=The Miraculous Preservation of the Qur'an. |url=http://www.manyprophetsonemessage.com/2014/01/08/the-miraculous-preservation-of-the-quran/ |website=Many Prophets One Message |publisher=One Reason |access-date=10 July 2019 |date=8 January 2014 |archive-date=10 July 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190710025157/http://www.manyprophetsonemessage.com/2014/01/08/the-miraculous-preservation-of-the-quran/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Muslims state that some who teach memorization/recitation of the Quran constitute the end of an "un-broken chain" whose original teacher was Muhammad himself.<ref name=arab-news-27-2-2015>{{cite news |title=Qur'an and its preservation through chain of oral tradition |url=http://www.arabnews.com/islam-perspective/news/710661 |access-date=13 June 2019 |agency=Arab News |date=27 February 2015 |archive-date=21 April 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190421140608/http://www.arabnews.com/islam-perspective/news/710661 |url-status=live }}</ref> It has been argued that "the Qur'an's rhythmic style and eloquent expression make it easy to memorize," and was made so to facilitate the "preservation and remembrance" of the work.<ref>The Qur'an, verses 44:58; 54:17, 22, 32, 40. Arab-news-27-2-2015</ref>

Islamic doctrine holds that from the time it was revealed to the present day, the Quran has not been altered,{{#tag:ref|An alternative belief is that some of what was revealed to Muhammad was later abrogated in some way by God. "The {{transliteration|ar|mushaf}} is incomplete, in the sense that not everything that was once revealed to Muhammad is to be found today in our {{transliteration|ar|mushaf}}. The Quran, however, is complete, in the sense that everything that God intends us to find in the {{transliteration|ar|mushaf}} we shall find there, for whatever God intended to include, He made sure to preserve..."<ref>{{Cite book | first1=John | last1=Burton | title=The Sources of Islamic Law: Islamic Theories of Abrogation | publisher=Edinburgh University Press | year=1990 | isbn=0-7486-0108-2 | url=http://www.almuslih.org/Library/Burton,%20J%20-%20The%20Sources%20of%20Islamic%20Law.pdf | access-date=21 July 2018 | ref=JBSILITA1990 | page=44 | archive-date=4 January 2020 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200104171116/http://www.almuslih.org/Library/Burton,%20J%20-%20The%20Sources%20of%20Islamic%20Law.pdf | url-status=dead }}</ref>|group=Note}} its continuity from divine revelation to its current written form ensured by the large numbers of Muhammad's supporters who had reverently memorized the work, a careful compiling process and divine intervention.<ref name="QP"/> (Muslim scholars agree that although scholars have worked hard to separate the corrupt and uncorrupted hadith, this other source of revelation is not nearly so free of corruption because of the hadith's great political and theological influence.)

At least two non-Muslim scholars ([[Alan Dundes]] and Andrew G. Bannister) have examined the possibility that the Quran was not just "recited orally, but actually composed orally".<ref name=AGBRtT2014:1>[[#AGBRtT2014|Bannister, "Retelling the Tale", 2014]]: p.1</ref> Bannister postulates that some parts of the Quran—such as the seven re-tellings of the story of the [[Iblis]] and [[Adam]], and the repeated phrases "which of the favours of your Lord will you deny?" in sura 55—make more sense addressed to listeners than readers.<ref name=AGBRtT2014:2/>

Banister, Dundes and other scholars (Shabbir Akhtar, Angelika Neuwirth, Islam Dayeh)<ref name=AGBRtT2014:1-4>[[#AGBRtT2014|Bannister, "Retelling the Tale", 2014]]: p.1-4</ref> have also noted the large amount of "formulaic" phraseology in the Quran consistent with "[[oral-formulaic composition]]" mentioned above.<ref name=ADFotA2003:16>[[#ADFotA2003|Dundes, ''Fables of the Ancients?'', 2003]]: p.16</ref> The most common formulas are the [[God in Islam#Attributes|attributes of Allah]]—all-mighty, all-wise, all-knowing, all-high, etc.—often found as doublets at the end of a verse. Among the other repeated phrases{{#tag:ref|Dundes lists of repeated phrases come from an English translation and so those Quranic phrases in the original Arabic sometimes have slight differences|group=Note}} are "Allah created the heavens and the earth" (found 19 times in the Quran).<ref>The Quran, 6:14, 79; 7:54, 10:3, 12:101, 14:10, 19, 32; 17:99, 29:44, 61; 30:8, 31:25, 32:4, 35:1, 39:38, 46; 42:11, 45:22, 46:33, cf. 2:117, 6:101</ref><ref name=ADFotA2003:32>[[#ADFotA2003|Dundes, ''Fables of the Ancients?'', 2003]]: p.32</ref>

As much as one third of the Quran is made up of "oral formulas", according to Dundes' estimates.<ref name=ADFotA2003:65>[[#ADFotA2003|Dundes, ''Fables of the Ancients?'', 2003]]: p.65</ref> Bannister, using a computer database of (the original Arabic) words of the Quran and of their "grammatical role, root, number, person, gender and so forth", estimates that depending on the length of the phrase searched, somewhere between 52% (three word phrases) and 23% (five word phrases) are oral formulas.<ref name=AGBRtT2014:6-7>[[#AGBRtT2014|Bannister, "Retelling the Tale", 2014]]: p.6-7</ref> Dundes reckons his estimates confirm "that the Quran was orally transmitted from its very beginnings". Bannister believes his estimates "provide strong corroborative evidence that oral composition should be seriously considered as we reflect upon how the Qur'anic text was generated."<ref name=AGBRtT2014:10>[[#AGBRtT2014|Bannister, "Retelling the Tale", 2014]]: p.10</ref>

Dundes argues oral-formulaic composition is consistent with "the cultural context of Arabic oral tradition", quoting researchers who have found poetry reciters in the [[Najd]] (the region next to where the Quran was revealed) using "a common store of themes, motives, stock images, phraseology and prosodical options",<ref name="P._Marcel_Kurpershoeck_1994:57">{{cite book |first1=P. Marcel |last1=Kurpershoeck |date=1994 |page=57 |title=Oral Poetry and Narratives from Central Arabia |volume=1 |location=Leiden |publisher=E.J.Brill}}</ref><ref name=AGBRtT2014:68>[[#AGBRtT2014|Bannister, "Retelling the Tale", 2014]]: p.68</ref> and "a discursive and loosely structured" style "with no fixed beginning or end" and "no established sequence in which the episodes must follow".{{ref|group=Note|Scholar Saad Sowayan referring to the genre of "Saudi Arabian historical oral narrative genre called {{transliteration|ar|suwalif}}".<ref name="Saad Sowayan,1992:22">{{cite book |first1=Saad |last1=Sowayan |date=1992 |page=22 |title=The Arabian Oral Historical Narrative: An Ethnographic and Linguistic Analysis |location=Wiesbaden |publisher=Otto Harrassowitz}}</ref><ref name=ADFotA2003:68-9>[[#ADFotA2003|Dundes, ''Fables of the Ancients?'', 2003]]: p.68-9</ref>