Back in 1968 I developed the hypothesis that perhaps the Qur’an’s “mysterious” alphabets (A.L.M., Q, N, T.S.M, etc.) possess specific distribution patterns within Qur’an. To test this hypothesis, I wrote the whole Qur’an into the computer, using English symbols for each Arabic character. The first output from the computer was published in 1972 in my book entitled MIRACLE OF QUR’AN: SIGNIFICANCE OF THE MYSTERIOUS ALPHABETS.” What I learned from that work was that the Qur’an’s mysterious initials occurred in their suras at the highest frequency; I knew nothing about the number 19 at that time. In retrospect, the number 19 was all over the place, as seen now on the pages of that first book, but it just was not God’s will that we see it.
What concerns me in this article is that the frequency of the letter “N ن ” where it occurs as an initial (Sura 68) appears in those first computer data, as printed in that 1972 book, as 133. This is of course the correct number, or the number that is supposed to be. However, what I fed the computer was only 132 N’s. That is because I used an Egyptian printing of Qur’an where the initial “N ن” is not spelled out, as is the case in the original Qur’an.
When it was God’s will to unveil His Miracle in Qur’an, and the role of the number 19 (see Qur’an 74:25-30), the frequency of the letter. “N ن” fit right in with the rest of the miracle, since the number 133 is a multiple of 19. A few months after publishing the results, the letters came pouring in to inform me that the frequency of the letter “N ن” is in fact 132, not 133. The absence, addition, or alteration of one word in Qur’an, of course, destroys the whole system; the whole mathematical system collapses. I then embarked on a world-wide search for the oldest Qur’ans and found out that the original Qur’an and the oldest copies did indeed spell out the Qur’anic initial “N ن.” into “Noon نون“
How did the computer report the correct result, despite the error in feeding? The only answer is: Obviously, we were dealing with God’s miracle in His Final Scripture, and He has manipulated the computer to inform the world of the correct data.
The Figure below is a photocopy from the 1972 book, showing the number of N’s in Sura 68 as 133. The computer did not pay attention to the data I fed into it. How did the computer generate an extra “N ن” to give us the correct number??!!
That was not the only incident where God has manipulated the computer in order to show us His Miracle. When I wrote the Qur’an into the computer, the number of the word “Allah” that I fed to the computer was in fact 2699. This is the wrong number. But the computer gave us the number that is supposed to be, namely 2698, or 19 x 142.
What I fed into the computer included one extra word “Allah” from the last two verses of Sura 9. We know now that those two verses do not belong in Qur’an (see the March Issue of MP). Thus, the computer did not pay any attention to the data that I fed into it. It gave us the correct count of the word “Allah” despite the erroreneous feeding.
The extra word “Allah” was discovered during the comprehensive review of Qur’an and the computer data at the word for word level, MANUALLY. Ironically, the computer skipped one word “Allah” in Sura 9. In my two books reporting the results: THE COMPUTER SPEAKS: GOD’S MESSAGE TO THE WORLD & QUR’AN: VISUAL PRESENTATION OF THE MIRACLE, it was noted that the computer reported only one word “Allah” in verse 15 of Sura 9. This verse contains two, not one, word “Allah.”
When I began this computer research into Qur’an, I had pledged that I will never say anything about the mathematical system of Qur’an unless the results are “unanimous,” i.e., without any discrepancies or exceptions. Had the computer reported 132 N’s back in 1972, the world would have never heard anything about the Qur’an’s mathematical miracle, at least not from me.
ALL WE CAN SAY, THEREFORE, IS “SUB-HANA ALLAH” “GOD BE GLORIFIED.”
(Rashad Khalifa)
By: Rashad Khalifa as Editor of Muslim Perspective, May, 1985
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