The Evangelical Dictionary of World Religions

QUAKERS. See RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS (QUAKERS)

QUORUM OF THE SEVENTY. A Quorum of the Seventy is a group of male leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) who have been set apart for the purpose of proclaiming the Mormon gospel to non-Mormons. Each Quorum of the Seventy is overseen by seven presidents, each of whom is a member of that same quorum and corporately manages that quorum’s affairs; moreover, each subgroup of seven presidents is governed by a presiding president. Though under the direct supervision of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and indirectly accountable to the First Presidency, members of these quorums are invested with the same authority as that of the Twelve Apostles appointed by LDS Church founder Joseph Smith Jr. (1805–44). As of November 2013, the LDS Church had eight seventy-member quorums: two (the first and second) that are general authorities with global jurisdiction and six (the third through eighth) that are area authorities with distinct regional jurisdictions.

The First Quorum of the Seventy met in 1835 and counted Joseph Young (1797–1881) and Levi Ward Hancock (1803–82) among its seven presidents. By 1845 there were ten quorums of seventy, geographically unrestricted and dispersed worldwide. In 1883 LDS president John Taylor (1808–87) gave each seventy-member quorum authority over a particular LDS stake. This arrangement continued until 1975–76, when LDS president Spencer W. Kimball (1895–1985) reorganized the LDS Church, merging the First Quorum of the Seventy, the First Council of the Seventy, and the Assistants to the Twelve into a new First Quorum of the Seventy. In 1989 the Second Quorum of the Seventy was formed. In 1997 LDS president Gordon B. Hinckley (1910–2008) announced the formation of the Third, Fourth, and Fifth Quorums of the Seventy, which were assembled to replace the former regional representatives of the Quorum of the Twelve. In 2004 the Fifth Quorum of the Seventy was divided to create the Sixth Quorum of the Seventy; the Seventh and Eighth Quorums of the Seventy were formed in 2005.

Bibliography. S. Fidel, “President Hinckley Announces New Quorums of the Seventy and Other New Officers,” Deseret News; D. L. Larson, “Seventy: Quorums of Seventy,” in Encyclopedia of Mormonism, edited by D. H. Ludlow, 4 vols.; A. K. Parrish, “Seventy: Overview,” in Encyclopedia of Mormonism, edited by D. H. Ludlow, 4 vols.; L. A. Porter, “A History of the Latter-Day Seventy,” Ensign; “Quorums of the Seventy,” https://www.lds.org/church/leaders/quorums-of-the-seventy; R. C. Roberts, “Seventy: First Council of the Seventy,” in Encyclopedia of Mormonism, edited by D. H. Ludlow, 4 vols.; Joseph Smith Jr. et al., The Doctrine and Covenants of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; J. Young, History of the Organization of the Seventies.

H. W. House

QUORUM OF THE TWELVE APOSTLES. See QUORUM OF THE SEVENTY

QUR’AN. The holy book of Islam believed by Muslims to be the words of God given to the Prophet Muhammad (d. 632) over the period of his twenty-two years of ministry is called the Qur’an. The word Qur’an appears seventy-three times inside the book and appears to mean “recitation” (from the Syriac qeryana), but only in 9:111, where the word is placed opposite the Torah and the Gospels, does it appear to refer to the Qur’an as an actual book of revelation.

Organization. In form the Qur’an is divided into 114 suras (conventionally, chapters), which are arranged roughly in order of descending length, with the exception of the opening sura, al-Fatiha (That which opens), which has seven verses. The reasons for this arrangement are unclear. Each sura has a title (some have several competing titles), but the title bears no necessary relation to the content of the sura. Instead, the title is usually a catchword taken from within the sura, apparently designed for easy memorization. Some of the shorter suras, however, such as 112, al-Ikhlas (Devotion), do roughly accord with their titles. The size of the suras varies widely, from sura 2, which has 286 verses, to sura 108, which has 3 verses. The final two suras, the Mu’awwidhatan (Suras of taking refuge) are, like the Fatiha, slightly out of place in terms of their verse number but have been placed at the end because they are amulets.

Chronology. The arrangement of the Qur’an bears no necessary relationship to the chronological revelation of the suras; indeed, the shorter suras at the end of the Qur’an are more likely to have been the earlier ones.

There is some disagreement about the first revelation given to Muhammad. In general Muslim consensus has stated that sura 96:1–5, “Recite in the name of your Lord,” was the first revelation (approximately 610; see Fakhry). In general the form of the early revelations is a dramatic one, invoking the natural and cosmic world by means of oaths (e.g., “by the sun and its forenoon brightness”; sura 91) and continuing on to explicit descriptions of the imminent end of the world and the coming day of judgment. Often Muhammad is spoken to directly and told to “say” something (sometimes as a response to outside events), which is then cited indirectly as a quotation in the text.

Themes. The themes of the Qur’an are varied. The basic theme is a bedrock monotheism, summarized by sura 112: “Say: He is Allah, the only One, Allah the everlasting. He did not beget and is not begotten. And none is His equal.” This monotheism is said to have been proclaimed by numerous messengers and prophets throughout history (mostly found in the biblical tradition) in a series of progressive revelations culminating in that given to Muhammad. Stories of the prophets (although the term prophet in Islam does not necessarily correspond to that in the Bible) are a major component of the Qur’an. For the most part, their experiences are monochromatic: God sends a prophet (or a messenger) to a sinful people, usually with signs; the people reject the prophet, sometimes killing him; and then God sends some form of punishment on the people. The stories of the prophets are sometimes related to those in the Bible (e.g., the story of Abraham’s sacrifice of one of his sons, 37:102, or the story of Joseph, sura 12) but in many cases are more closely related to Jewish midrashic or Christian apocryphal materials. Most of the stories concerning Jesus, said to be the last prophet prior to Muhammad, are closely related to noncanonical gospel stories.

Other major themes of the Qur’an are apocalyptic visions of the end of the world and threats against disbelievers and the heedless, who live their lives in willful ignorance of the coming day of judgment. Teachings about Allah (God) describe him as a merciful and compassionate god and one who supplies humanity with knowledge but who is also completely unconnected with his creation other than through the sending of messengers and the punishment of sinners. In the Qur’an, the Muslim social order is detailed, including frequent admonishments to pray, do acts of charity, fast for Ramadan, and follow other standard Muslim ordinances. A high percentage of the long first suras detail the founding of the Muslim community in Medina (622–32), the theological controversies Muhammad had with the Jewish population of the oasis town, and his wars with both the Jews and his polytheist neighbors that culminated in his conquest of Mecca (630). Descriptions of fighting and the theological justifications for it and rewards stemming from it are frequent inside these suras.

The Qur’an and Muhammad. Muhammad is addressed personally in the Qur’an. In general the revelation of the Qur’an is said to have been through the agency of the angel Gabriel (Jibril) to Muhammad personally, after which the latter then recited the content to the believers. Many of the suras deal with Muhammad’s personal life, his doubts and depression, his conflicts with his polytheist and Jewish foes, and his struggles to bind the Muslim community together. The Qur’an speaks of several different groups: the believers who accepted Muhammad’s leadership completely; the polytheists, who rejected it completely; the Jews, who should have been allies of Muhammad but instead rejected him out of spite; and the “hypocrites,” who sometimes accepted Muhammad but sometimes proved to be unreliable (e.g., sura 33). Beyond the building of the community, Muhammad’s personal life focused on his wives, who, although they held a special place (33:32), were also unruly and the focus of a great many restrictions that were later imposed on Muslim women as a whole.

The Qur’an’s Impact on Culture. The attraction of the Qur’an from the time of Muhammad has been centered on the fact that it is an “Arabic” revelation (e.g., 12:2), especially for Arabic-speaking people but later for all humanity. Through the Qur’an, Arabic was standardized and popularized throughout the Muslim world, and it continues to be the portal through which most Muslims experience the Qur’an. In general, since the first revelations, that experience has been an auditory one, where the sonorous nature of the recitation has a hypnotic and captivating quality about it.

Textual Criticism and Interpretations. Because the Qur’an was recited during the early period of Islam, its collection was delayed somewhat—to the period of the caliph ‘Uthman (644–56), according to the traditional accounts. Although the text established by ‘Uthman has been authoritative among Muslims (with some disagreements by Shi‘ites, who claimed that sections were suppressed), there are numerous variant readings (qira’at). This fact is due to the unvocalized and unpointed nature of the Arabic script during this early period, which means that Arabic words can be read in a number of different ways. These variant readings exist in seven (or fourteen) separate reading traditions descending from the early reciters of the Qur’an; however, in practice only two of those are in wide currency today.

Variant readings were one of the contributing factors to the appearance of exegetical literature (ta’wil or tafsir) about the Qur’an. Early commentators like Muqatil b. Sulayman (d. 767) interworked their interpretation with the text, supplying explanations, glosses, or additional detail as needed. Major medieval commentators such as al-Tabari (d. 923) took each verse separately and explained it by means of traditions, grammatical comments, and their own opinions. This exegesis is summarized in the most popular commentary by al-Suyuti (d. 1505), the Tafsir al-Jalalayn, which is portable. Many exegetes used the Qur’an as a mine for legal rulings and arranged their commentaries according to the law that could be derived from the Qur’an. For this purpose, the Qur’an was rearranged into chronological order, where certain verses that were chronologically said to be later abrogated earlier verses (as there are numerous apparent contradictions inside the text). Sufi mystics interpreted the Qur’an allegorically, radically rereading many of the themes described above and searching out hidden and symbolic meanings. In this they were joined by Shi‘ites, who were in many cases dissatisfied because the content of the Qur’an does not explicitly affirm the rights of the Prophet’s family to rule. In some cases, such as Isma‘ili Shi‘ite exegesis, the exegesis is completely divorced from or even in opposition to the plain meaning of the text. In general contemporary exegetes of the Qur’an have favored the idea that the Qur’an is its own exegesis and have avoided using the traditional materials or have sought to “prove” that science is in accord with or is prophesied by the text.

Scholarly critique of the Qur’an has focused on establishing a scientific text that would include the best possible readings from all the variants, examining the sources on which the Qur’an is based, or in some cases its parallels in other classical religious literature, and the foreign vocabulary of the Qur’an. However, the Qur’an has been particularly resistant to any type of source criticism or absolute chronology, and there is no consensus even as to the likely sources of its ideas or imagery.

Issues of Translation. Traditionally the Qur’an has been read in Arabic, and in contradistinction to the Bible there has never been a massive Muslim effort to translate it. Usually the paradigm has been to bring people to the Qur’an, to surround it with an aura of holiness that is both physical (in terms of ensuring that it is not desecrated or dishonored in any way) and linguistic in nature. Muslims who are not Arabic speaking will have to learn some of the Qur’an (usually the Fatiha) for the purpose of prayers, but frequently this learning will be nothing more than memorization without any comprehension. Very conservative Muslims still maintain that the Qur’an should not be translated and are sometimes reluctant to give the Arabic text to a nonbeliever for fear it would be desecrated.

However, numerous translations are available. The oldest standard one is that of George Sale (d. 1736), which was in use during the nineteenth century. During the early twentieth century, the two major Muslim translations, that of ‘Abdallah Yusuf ‘Ali (1934), The Qur’an (favored by South Asian Muslims), and that of Muhammad Marmaduke Pickthall (1930), The Meaning of the Glorious Qur’an (favored by the Saudi Arabian government), were completed. Standard non-Muslim translations by Arthur Arberry (The Koran Interpreted, 1955), as well as Ahmed Ali (al-Qur’an), Majid Fakhry (The Qur’an: A Modern English Version), and Tarif Khalidi (The Qur’an), have avoided the King James style utilized by the two Muslim translations. Others such as Richard Bell (The Qur’an) and N. J. Dawood (The Koran with Parallel Arabic Text) have radically rearranged the text with either chronology or readability in mind.

The Meaning of the Qur’an for Muslims. For Muslims the Qur’an is the very words of God, and reverence for the Qur’an and belief in its power, its eternal relevance, and its abrogation of any other possible revelation have been central to Islam. As Wilfred Cantwell Smith said a half century ago, the Qur’an is to Islam what Jesus is to Christianity. Criticism of it, denigration of it (real or perceived), or interpretation of it in an allegorical or nonliteral manner has been met in the recent past with hostility and sometimes violence. Its presentation of the cosmos, of history (especially salvation history), and of humanity continues to be fundamental to Islam.

Bibliography. A. Ali, al-Qur’an; A. Y. Ali, The Qur’an; A. Arberry, The Koran Interpreted; R. Bell, The Qur’an; C. E. Bosworth et al., eds., Encyclopedia of Islam; N. J. Dawood, The Koran with Parallel Arabic Text; M. Fakhry, The Qur’an: A Modern English Version; H. Gatje, trans., The Qur’an and Its Exegesis; T. Khalidi, The Qur’an; J. MacAuliffe, ed., The Encyclopedia of the Qur’an; M. M. Pickthall, The Meaning of the Glorious Qur’an; Quran and Science website, http://www.quranandscience.com/; W. C. Smith, Islam in Modern History; M. b. Sulayman, Tafsir, edited by A. M. Shihata; J. a. al-Suyuti, Tafsir al-Jalalayn; M. b. J. al-Tabari, Jami‘ al-bayan fi ta’wil ayy al-Qur’an.

D. B. Cook