The Qur'an as the Criterion · What Furqan Means
What Furqan actually means
In short
- 1.Furqan means the thing that separates truth from falsehood.
- 2.Q 3:3-4 sends down the Torah and the Gospel, then sends down the Furqan.
- 3.Confirming a message is not the same as endorsing every line of a later book.
The claim being examined
People assume that if the Qur'an confirms earlier scripture, it must be endorsing the Bible we hold today.
The Islamic position
The Qur'an calls itself al-Furqan, the criterion: it confirms the revelation God sent before, and at the same time judges what people later did with it.
Analysis
Furqan (فرقان) comes from the root f-r-q, to separate or distinguish, and it is used in the Qur'an both as a name for revelation and for the decisive day of Badr (Q 8:41). In Q 3:3-4 the Torah and the Gospel are named as guidance sent before, and immediately after them the Furqan is sent down — the sequence itself is the argument: the later revelation stands over the earlier as the measure. Classical exegetes read tasdiq (confirmation) in Q 5:48 as confirmation of the divine origin and core content of the earlier books, not as a certificate for the manuscripts circulating in the seventh century or now. The same verse then adds muhaymin, which al-Tabari and Ibn Kathir gloss as guardian, witness and trustee over what came before. So there is no tension between "confirming" and "correcting": in the Qur'an's own vocabulary they are one function. When someone says "your book says the Bible is true", the accurate answer is that the Qur'an affirms that God revealed the Torah to Musa and the Injil to Isa, peace be upon them, and then places itself as the judge of what survives of them.
From the Qur'an
نَزَّلَ عَلَيْكَ الْكِتَابَ بِالْحَقِّ مُصَدِّقًا لِّمَا بَيْنَ يَدَيْهِ وَأَنزَلَ التَّوْرَاةَ وَالْإِنجِيلَ مِن قَبْلُ هُدًى لِّلنَّاسِ وَأَنزَلَ الْفُرْقَانَ
He sent down to you the Book in truth, confirming what came before it, and He sent down the Torah and the Gospel before as guidance for the people, and He sent down the Criterion.
تَبَارَكَ الَّذِي نَزَّلَ الْفُرْقَانَ عَلَىٰ عَبْدِهِ
Blessed is He who sent down the Criterion upon His servant.
Sources
al-Tabari, Jami al-Bayan, on Q 5:48 · Ibn Kathir, Tafsir, on Q 3:3-4 · Qur'an 3:3-4; 25:1
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