Signs & Miracles · The Language Argument in Full

Is the Miracle Its News of the Unseen?

Handle with care. Do not present prophecy claims as part of the literary argument. Mixing them lets a critic knock down one and think he has knocked down both.

In short

1.Prophecy and unseen history are genuine evidentiary features of the Qur'an.
2.But they occur in a minority of verses, whereas the challenge is issued over any surah.
3.A three-verse surah with no prophecy in it is still covered by the challenge.
4.So the inimitable quality must be something present throughout — which points back to composition.

The claim being examined

A second theory locates the miracle in the Qur'an's reports of hidden past events and future ones, rather than in its language.

The Islamic position

Al-Khattabi accepts these as signs but denies they can be the miracle, since they appear in only part of the text.

Analysis

This is a structural argument, and it is the reason the Miracle of the Qur'an section sits alongside, not inside, Proofs of Prophecy. Al-Khattabi's reasoning is simple: the challenge is issued at the level of the surah, including the shortest ones, so whatever makes the Qur'an inimitable must be a property of any surah. Reports of the unseen do not satisfy that condition. He therefore treats prophecy as a supporting evidence — one of the signs — while insisting that i'jaz proper is a feature of the speech itself. This also protects the argument from a common failure mode, where an entire case for revelation is loaded onto a handful of contested predictions.

From the Qur'an

Qur'an 30:2-4

غُلِبَتِ ٱلرُّومُ فِىٓ أَدْنَى ٱلْأَرْضِ وَهُم مِّنۢ بَعْدِ غَلَبِهِمْ سَيَغْلِبُونَ فِى بِضْعِ سِنِينَ

The Romans have been defeated in the nearest land, and they, after their defeat, will overcome within a few years.

Qur'an 108

إِنَّآ أَعْطَيْنَٰكَ ٱلْكَوْثَرَ

Indeed We have granted you al-Kawthar. So pray to your Lord and sacrifice. Indeed your enemy is the one cut off.

Sources

Al-Khattabi, Bayan I'jaz al-Qur'an · al-Baqillani, I'jaz al-Qur'an · Al-Khattabi, The Miracle of the Qur'an (Sapience Publishing, 2022)

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