Muhammad The Great Exemplar — Page 42
Hazrat Mirza Bashir-ud-Din Mahmud Ahmad 42 aside. So, perforce, any divine scripture must be protected for as long as it serves a need in the world. And when its protection ceases it can be rightly assumed the world has no more need for it and it is thus abandoned. The people to whom the Holy Qur’an was revealed were bereft of all knowledge and learning. In contrast, other scriptures were given to literate peoples and nations. But despite their more pronounced sophistication, they were unable to preserve their original texts. The Holy Qur’an on the other hand is just as it was at the time of the demise of the Holy Prophet sa. It cannot be said that its preservation owes itself to more favourable circumstances than other holy books, nor can it be claimed its authenticity has yet to be truly tested by historical scholarship and that when it is subjected to rigorous dissection, faults and discrepancies will reveal themselves. In order to conceal [and deflect attention from the] inaccuracies of the Bible, Christian scholars have, for the past century, studied the history of the Qur’an and been so scrupulous in their efforts that at times, it might appear to someone who does not know them well, that they hold the Qur’an in even greater esteem than Muslims. But despite their exertions, they have failed in their objectives — that is to say, they have been unable to produce even a single word which is a later insertion and not an original part of the Holy Qur’an.