This book stirred up a massive controversy among Islamic scholars of the Quran because it challenges many of the fundamental assumptions made by Muslims about their holy book. At the same time, the book doesn't in any way seem to detract from the message of the Quran. As such, I found it a fascinating read on a number of levels. It was linguistically interesting for me as I have studied Aramaic and read works in Syriac, it was historically interesting as a contribution into uncovering the true history of the growth of Islam, and from a religious perspective it was interesting to see how ideas were changed by the society that accepted them.

Luxenberg realized that his theses would be controversial and likely, dangerous, and so the name "Christoph Luxenberg" is a pseudonym chosen by the author to avoid the knife of a blood-crazed fanatic. The reason why Luxenberg's hypothesis is controversial for Muslims is manifold. However, I think the controversy can be reduced to a few major points.

First, Luxenberg dares to completely change the accepted reading of the Quran, thereby implying that everyone who claims the title of hafiz has actually learned the Quran incorrectly:

"...to this day nobody has dared to take seriously into consideration the occasionally expressed suspicion that the Koran text was misread and distorted not only by the introduction of vowel signs, but especially by the subsequently inserted diacritical points that first established the original consonantal script."

In other words, Luxenberg has stripped away the dots that distinguish, for example, b, t, th, n and y in Arabic, and realized that they could be interchanged. He also stripped away the vowels completely and allowed any possible reading. Likewise, he recognized that many supposedly "classical" usages of the Arabic language are not attested anywhere else, and the two most ancient commentaries on the Quran, the Lisan al'arab by Ibn Manzur and the commentary by Tabari, often do not understand how to translate much of the Quran. Despite this, their commentaries are followed blindly by the entire Muslim world.

The reason Luxenberg did this is because a vast amount of the text of the Quran itself just doesn't make any sense, and the commentaries weren't able to do much more than guess at the meaning, often with disastrous results. Luxenberg's fellow-scholar (or perhaps even alter ego) Gerd Puin, summarizes this problem with the Quran well:

The Qur’an claims for itself that it is ‘mubeen,’ or clear, but if you look at it, you will notice that every fifth sentence or so simply doesn’t make sense. Many Muslims will tell you otherwise, of course, but the fact is that a fifth of the Qur’anic text is just incomprehensible. This is what has caused the traditional anxiety regarding translation. If the Qur’an is not comprehensible, if it can’t even be understood in Arabic, then it’s not translatable into any language. That is why Muslims are afraid. Since the Qur’an claims repeatedly to be clear but is not, there is an obvious and serious contradiction. Something else must be going on.

Luxenberg shows, in example after example, how this is the case. Many verbs only appear in the Quran, and are given arbitrary meanings to try to make some sense out of sentences that have none.

Luxenberg's method to resolve these obscure readings is to review Aramaic meanings, particularly from Syriac, the most influential Aramaic dialect, and see if a particular passage was misinterpreted, allowing for one consonant to be substituted with another if they could have been confused in the original, unpointed text of the Quran. For example, Sura 34:5 reads, traditionally:

But those who busy themselves with Our signs, seeking to make them of no effect - for them is a punishment of wrath painful.

Luxenberg's method retranslates this as:

And those who contentiously scoffed at Our signs will be meted out a punishment by divine wrath.

In Sura 19:24, regarding Mary and the birth of Jesus, the traditional reading is obscure and hard to even fathom:

Then he (the child) called to her from beneath her: "Grieve not; thy Lord hath placed beneath thee a streamlet.

Luxenberg shows how this should read:

Then he called to her immediately after her delivery: "Do not be sad, your Lord has made your delivery legitimate."

Given the context (Mary is worrying that she, a virgin, has given birth), it is unclear how seeing a stream beneath her would somehow dispel her fears.

The second issue that traditional Muslims likely have with Luxenberg is his position that Islam developed out of a Christian Arab sect that had issues with the Trinity. Luxenberg posits that much of the Quran was pre-existing Arab Christian hymns translated from Syriac into Arabic. For example, the nearly incomprehensible short Sura 108, "Al-Kawthar" (traditionally translated as "The Abundance") traditionally reads as follows:

Sura 108 - The Abundance

1. Verily, We have given thee the abundance; 2. So pray to thy Lord, and sacrifice. 3. Verily, it is he who hateth thee who is the docked one.

Taking Syriac roots as the basis of the disputed readings, Luxenberg fairly easily shows how the reading should be, in actuality:

Sura 108 - Constancy

1. We have given you the virtue of constancy; 2. So pray to your Lord and persevere (in prayer); 3. Your adversary (i.e., the devil) is then the loser.

This mirrors the First Epistle of Peter, Chapter 5, Verses 8-9, in their Syriac reading:

8 Wake up (Brothers) and be vigilant, because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: 9 Who resist steadfast in the faith.

Also in this tradition, Sura 96 - traditionally "the Clotted Blood" - becomes "The Clay" and the phrases

1. Recite in the name of your Lord who has created, 2. has created man out of clotted blood (or: an embryo)! 3. Recite! Your Lord is noble like nobody in the world. 4. He who taught the use of the qalam-pen 5. taught man what he did not know beforehand. 6. No! Man is truly rebellious, 7. that he considers himself his own master 8. Yet to your Lord all things return.

become, when reviewed with Luxenberg's method:

1. Call in the name of your Lord who has created 2. has created man from clay! 3. Call your most admirable Lord, 4. who has taught by the qalam-pen (i.e., through scripture) 5. has taught man what he did not know at all. 6. Verily, man forgets, 7. when he sees that he has become rich, 8. that he is to be returned to your Lord.

Ultimately, nothing that Luxenberg says attacks the overall message of the Quran (where it is possible to understand what that message is). He is merely applying good Western literary criticism to passages that on their face make no or little sense, or make no sense given the context, and proposing alternative readings based on the linguistic and cultural history of the region.

The problem is that his approach flies in the face of the built-up myths about Islam. His view of the Quran as an "Arabic lectionary" for schismatic Christians who ultimately became a separate religion altogether defies the idea that the Quran is a "perfect" revelation that exists in some divine form in Heaven (which, Luxenberg points out, is probably itself a misunderstanding of certain Quran passages). It challenges the skewed Arabic names "Ibrahim" (should have been Abraham, just like in the West), "Yahya" (should have been "Yochna", from "Yochan" or John) and others. It challenges the reading of entire ideas, like the houris of paradise.

The houri myth was a later addition used to then explain a very difficult reading that Luxenberg shows actually refers to white grapes. Entire sentences tortuously changed to transform passages paired with water (water and grapes) to have these maidens who were always virgins, with one of the names of God on each breast along with their husband's name.

Passages about the houris that were tortured into new forms include the following:

Sura 44:54 and 52:20 went from being "We will make you comfortable under vines of white clear grapes" to "and We have married them with houris"

Sura 2:25 went from being "all manner of species of pure fruit" to "therein also are pure spouses for them".

Sura 37:48-49 went from being "They will have hanging fruits, jewel-like, as were they pearls still enclosed in their shells" to being "With them are wide-eyed ones restrained in glance, as they were pearls, well-guarded."

Sura 38:52 went from being "Among them will be juicy fruits, hanging down in clusters" to "With them are ones restrained in glance, of equal age."

Sura 55:70,72,74 went from being "Therein are choice, first-rate fruits; white grapes hanging in wine bowers; which neither man nor djinni (genius) has ever besmirched" to being "In them are those good and beautiful; wide-eyed, restrained in their tents; whom deflowered before them has neither man nor djinni".

Finally, Sura 78:31-34 went from "The pious will have a place of felicity: gardens and grapes and lush, succulent fruits and a brimming-full wine cup" to being "For the pious is a place of felicity, orchards and vineyards, and full-breasted ones of equal age, and a cup overflowing".

A simple, bucolic view of Paradise was turned into a sexually frustrated man's dysfunctional earthly dream. Oddly enough, St. Ephraem the Syrian wrote a text about paradise in the Fourth Century where he spoke of the grapes of Heaven:

He who has abstained from wine here below, for him yearn the grapevines of Paradise. Each of them extends him a drooping cluster. And if someone has lived in chastity, then they receive him in their pure bosom, because as a monk he fell not in the bosom and bed of earthly love.

Anyone reading this cannot help but see the influence of St. Ephraem in the passages about the houris.

Certainly, pre-Islamic roots for parts of the Quran contradict the folk-myth of Gabriel coming down from Heaven and dictating the Quran in its entirety to Muhammad.

These contradictions and deconstruction of myth frighten and threaten the simplistic, childish faith of the naive, the ignorant and the stupid (this statement is generally true regardless of religion - look at how evangelicals feel threatened by the fact of evolution). However, as the world becomes more complex and sophisticated, this sort of deconstruction, based on solid literary criticism, will likely help Muslims who need a modern faith in a modern world find more, and not less, comfort in their faith.

As for the people who wipe their ass with their hands, treat their women like property and want to ban dancing, well, I couldn't give a shit what they think about this book or anything else for that matter, provided someone can produce evidence that they think at all.