More on Miracle of Numbers
The Light (UK), June 2006 Issue (p. 6)
In our January issue we published an article commenting on, and refuting, the notion that the number of times that certain words occur in the Quran (for example, ‘man’, ‘woman’, ‘month’, ‘day’) has been designed to provide a miracle. Our valued friend Reza Ghafoerkhan of Suriname wrote to us the following e-mail in this connection:
“I read your article An alleged ‘miracle’ in the Holy Quran about the occurrence of certain words in the Quran. Today I came across another example of this in some Islamic magazine. It says that the earth surface consists of 71% of water and 29% of land. The word bahr (sea) occurs 32 times in the Quran and the word barr (land) 13 times. This sums up to 45. And 32/45 is 71% and 13/45 is 29%.
“Another miracle? By the way, the real miracle of the Quran is the reforming influence it has on man. See how it transformed a barbaric Arabic nation into a civilized, pious one.”
In this case also, the argument of these people fails in the same way as for the other words like ‘man’ and ‘woman’, as shown in our article.
Firstly, there is another word for ‘sea’ in the Quran and that is yamm. Take the following two close verses about the Egyptians and the Israelites:
فَانۡتَقَمۡنَا مِنۡہُمۡ فَاَغۡرَقۡنٰہُمۡ فِی الۡیَمِّ
7:136: “So We exacted retribution from them and drowned them (Pharaoh’s armies) in the sea.”
وَ جٰوَزۡنَا بِبَنِیۡۤ اِسۡرَآءِیۡلَ الۡبَحۡرَ
7:138: “And We took the Children of Israel across the sea.”
The same sea is mentioned but the word for it in 7:136 is yamm and in 7:138 it is bahr. So this means the occurrences of yamm should be counted as well, and there are several other occurrences of yamm as meaning ‘sea’ in the Quran, for example in 20:78, 20:97, 28:40.
Secondly, the word bahr occurs in the plural as well. In 31:27 we read:
وَ لَوۡ اَنَّ مَا فِی الۡاَرۡضِ مِنۡ شَجَرَۃٍ اَقۡلَامٌ وَّ الۡبَحۡرُ یَمُدُّہٗ مِنۡۢ بَعۡدِہٖ سَبۡعَۃُ اَبۡحُرٍ مَّا نَفِدَتۡ کَلِمٰتُ اللّٰہِ ؕ
“And if all the trees in the earth were pens, and the sea with seven more seas added to it (were ink), the words of Allah would not be exhausted.”
Here the first ‘sea’ is bahr and the second ‘seas’ is the plural abhur. Here they count ‘sea’ but not ‘seas’.
The word bahr also occurs in the dual form bahrain 5 times. They do not count those occurrences in their theory. If they were to do so, would they count each occurrence of this dual word bahrain as being one or as two!
Similarly, barr is not the only word meaning ‘land’. There is also the word balad, meaning ‘land’, as for example in 7:58 as follows:
وَ الۡبَلَدُ الطَّیِّبُ یَخۡرُجُ نَبَاتُہٗ بِاِذۡنِ رَبِّہٖ ۚ وَ الَّذِیۡ خَبُثَ لَا یَخۡرُجُ اِلَّا نَکِدًا ؕ
“And the good land — its vegetation comes forth (abundantly) by the permission of its Lord. And that which is inferior — (its herbage) comes forth but scantily.”
In the verse 31:27 quoted just above, ‘earth’, for which the Arabic word is ard, refers to the land mass of the earth as opposed to the sea. Likewise in 32:27 the same word ard means dry land:
اَوَ لَمۡ یَرَوۡا اَنَّا نَسُوۡقُ الۡمَآءَ اِلَی الۡاَرۡضِ الۡجُرُزِ
“See they not that We drive the water to a land having no herbage…”
But of course, these occurrences of ‘land’ are not counted in their theory.