Understanding the Qur’anic Miracle Stories in the Modern Age

Abstract

In the introduction to her Understanding the Qur’anic Miracle Stories in theModern Age, Isra Yazicioglu writes about the dilemma of how readers are tounderstand such stories. She poses the question that if both the Qur’an andscholars of Islamic thought argue that Muhammad’s message is his miracle(p. 5) and that natural phenomena contain miracles, then why is there a needfor such narrations? And since they are only narrations of miracles, for readersdo not actually witness these miracles, do they “count as evidence ofGod’s power?” (p. 8). Stemming from these and other related questions,much of the book revolves around issues of causation and sources of knowledge.This book will appeal to advanced university students and academicsinterested in Qur’anic studies and especially in Islamic philosophy.Part I, “Medieval Muslim Debate,” includes a chapter on al-Ghazali andIbn Rushd. Each chapter includes a welcome biographical section on thescholar under discussion. Starting with al-Ghazali, we see the idea that Godcan and has sent miracles to verify His messengers and that this is fundamentalin Islam (p. 18). These miracles enable people to discern betweenprophets and imposters (p. 19) and by creating miracles God “nonverbally ...