Augustus
…
The thing is that it doesn't actually have the stories, mostly it simply has references to them. This leads to the necessary assumption that the audience were aware of these stories already. The Quran reflects a largely Abrahamic environment, and the much of the religious background comes from mainstream 7th C Syriac Christianity (I'm not saying it was 'copied' though)
It's also worth noting that much of these kind of ideas developed a century or 2 after the time of Muhammad, much as the Christian tradition developed over time by adding to the teachings of the historical Jesus. 9th C Islam is significantly removed from the original religious movement of Muhammad.
Muhammad's illiteracy was possibly (probably?) one such later addition.
For example:
Based on these items of evidence on the expression al-nabi al-ummi, one may draw
the following conclusions:
Firstly, in Qur'anic usage, both sing, ummi and pi. ummiyyun do not represent a single meaning, but a spectrum of ideas. This spectrum covers distinct, however, intimately connected sub-meanings such as:
- anyone belonging to a people: the Arabs - i.e., a people not having a Scripture (yet);
- anyone not having a scripture-i.e., not reading it, or not reading in it;
- anyone not reading (a scripture) - i.e., not being taught or educated (by some thing or somebody).
Only the given Qur'anic context can finally determine which aspect of this semantic field is preferable for the understanding of the relevant passages of the Qur'an. Secondly, the philological-historical examination of the three Qur'anic terms ummi, ummiyyun, and umma does not confirm the popular interpretation of ummi, which focuses exclusively on illiteracy. Rather, this interpretation seems to reflect a post Qur'anic approach thate volved in circles of Muslim learning (possibly not before the first half of the 2nd/8th century)123 and thath as been shaped furtheru nder the influence o fMuslim theologians and apologists. These findings are based on the information given in medieval Muslim sources. However, they are also supported by somemedieval Christian Arabic sources.124 Thirdly, when understood in thew ay shown here, the Qur'anic expression al-nabi al ummi can contribute essentially to the understanding of the history of Islam since it stresses both:
- the ethnic origin (Arab, Arabian), and
- the originality of the Prophet of Islam.125
Somewhat similar to Christianity, where God reveals Himself through Christ ('theword made flesh'), and where the virginity of the Mother of Christ, Mary, is required to produce an immaculate vessel for the Divine Word, so in Islam, God lets people
know about His existence through the Qur'an. The Prophet of Islam - communicating theW ord of God - came to be seen like 'a vessel thatw as unpolluted by 'intellectual' knowledge of word and script, so thath e could carry the trust' that God had
granted him through the revelation 'in perfect purity.'126
(Muḥammad, the Illiterate Prophet: An Islamic Creed in the Qur'an and Qur'anic Exegesis, S Gunther, Journal of Qur'anic Studies, Vol. 4, No. 1 2002)
