Would you delete a copy of the Koran?

[Nabeel]

It's a poorly worded question: do you mean 'deleting' as a political gesture, some equivalent of the American pastor's aggression, or 'deleting' just as tidying-up a reader?

By anyone's standards, the Koran is an important book: it created a language (Arabic), an Empire or two (the Arab Empire in North Africa and Spain, the Ottoman Empire) and a religion. However, the previous points about interpretation are important: the idea that you can just open up a Koran and then understand what one billion Muslims think makes no sense.

And, by-the-way, I'm a born-again atheist.

Nabeel

[astra]

Originally Posted by Nabeel

And, by-the-way, I'm a born-again atheist.
Nabeel

Nice. I didn't know this terming. Ta for enlightening!

[FlorenceArt]

How can a book create a language? I'm skeptical

[astra]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

How can a book create a language? I'm skeptical

Fairytale...

[Logseman]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

How can a book create a language? I'm skeptical

Well... The Qu'ran pretty much is the base for the language today known as Arabic, the first printed Bibles were the foundation of modern German... Since the very idea of writing comes with the military-administrative-religious concept involving a state, it's only normal that formal languages appear from those three social institutions.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

How can a book create a language? I'm skeptical

Why? Dante's works created modern Italian, if you want another example, and Caxton's choice of which English dialect he printed his books in was enormously influential in determining which of those (pretty mutually unintelligible) dialects did win out. There are all sorts of examples of books determining the path that the evolution of language has taken; you really shouldn't be skeptical about it.

[FlorenceArt]

Originally Posted by Logseman

Well... The Qu'ran pretty much is the base for the language today known as Arabic, the first printed Bibles were the foundation of modern German...

I'd like to see some quotes on that, please.

A language has to exist before you write a book in it, otherwise nobody would be able to read the book (not to mention write it).

I can admit a very influential book, such as the Bible or Koran, can help generalize a particular variant of a language, or fix some forms that were more fluctuating before, but that's hardly creating a language. More like an early form of globalization. People who spoke different dialects, more or less related, come to use a more common language.

Originally Posted by HarryT

Why? Dante's works created modern Italian, if you want another example, and Caxton's choice of which English dialect he printed his books in was enormously influential in determining which of those (pretty mutually unintelligible) dialects did win out. There are all sorts of examples of books determining the path that the evolution of language has taken; you really shouldn't be skeptical about it.

See, that's what I meant. It's not inventing a language or creating it. It's selecting which variant of the language will become global. That's totally different, even though I agree that it can have a big influence on the evolution of the language.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

A language has to exist before you write a book in it, otherwise nobody would be able to read the book (not to mention write it).

Before Dante there was no language called "Italian"; just lots of different regional dialects in what we now call Italy but what was, at the time, numerous independent city-states. It you spoke Venetian, for example, you would not have been able to understand very much of what someone from Naples (who spoke Neapolitan) was saying. What Dante did was to create a written language that everyone in Italy could learn to understand and use.

I don't know anything about it, but I suspect that the Koran did something similar to this with Arabic - created a "standard" out of a mish-mash of regional dialects.

[Logseman]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luther_Bible

The Luther Bible by reason of its widespread circulation facilitated the emergence of the modern German language by standardizing it for the peoples of the Holy Roman Empire, an empire embodying most of present day Germany. It is considered a landmark in German literature.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koran#Arab_writing

Although Arabic, as a language and a literary tradition, was quite well developed by the time of Muhammad's prophetic activity, it was only after the emergence of Islam, with its founding scripture in Arabic, that the language reached its utmost capacity of expression, and the literature its highest point of complexity and sophistication. Indeed, it probably is no exaggeration to say that the Qur’an was one of the most conspicuous forces in the making of classical and post-classical Arabic literature.

And eventually the Basque language as well.

[FlorenceArt]

Facilitate the emergence of a language and spread it in a wider area and population, that I can accept. It makes sense even. But this is absolutely not the same as creating a language. Volapük and Esperanto are created languages. Italian, German and Arabic are historical languages, evolved over centuries. That their evolution was affected by the diffusion of certain written words I can understand. But they were not created in a book.

[sigma8]

Originally Posted by JimKal

I think your last sentence above has much to commend it but sometimes the grip of a bad idea (in this case, the certitude that a God approves of a despicable act) is the problem. People have and will make choices that go against their political and socioeconomic interest when consumed by religious fever.

Right, but the fever doesn't come on its own accord. It needs an instigator. I think we're pretty much on the same page, and I got the important parts of my point across. I don't want to enter a tangent debate, but I'd like to add that while the "influenced" may be swept up primarily due to religious fervor, the instigator is often pursuing political goals... I'm happy to concede this is a rich and complex topic, though.

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by Nabeel

It's a poorly worded question: do you mean 'deleting' as a political gesture, some equivalent of the American pastor's aggression, or 'deleting' just as tidying-up a reader?

By anyone's standards, the Koran is an important book: it created a language (Arabic), an Empire or two (the Arab Empire in North Africa and Spain, the Ottoman Empire) and a religion. However, the previous points about interpretation are important: the idea that you can just open up a Koran and then understand what one billion Muslims think makes no sense.

And, by-the-way, I'm a born-again atheist.

Nabeel

It's true that you can't just open a Qu'ran and instantly understand what a billion Muslims are thinking, but reading it does help to understand their mythology (I use that term in the academic sense with no judgment intended as to it's veracity), and thus opens a major window into understanding them as a group. It is the language which has helped shape their thinking and in which they express themselves.

Born-again atheist: does that mean you've been born-again again? I understand.

Very nice first post, and welcome to MobileRead!

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

Facilitate the emergence of a language and spread it in a wider area and population, that I can accept. It makes sense even. But this is absolutely not the same as creating a language.

Dante actually did create the written Italian language. Prior to his time, spoken Italian (in all its various dialects) was regarded merely as a degenerate form of Latin, and all scholarly writing in Italy (as elsewhere) was in Latin. Dante was the person who took the vernacular spoken language (primarily his own Florentine dialect) and, for the first time, wrote it down. creating a language that he called "Italian". That's why he's called "The Father of Italian". This is hard to appreciate for an English speaker because nothing comparable has ever happened to English.

[Logseman]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

Facilitate the emergence of a language and spread it in a wider area and population, that I can accept. It makes sense even. But this is absolutely not the same as creating a language. Volapük and Esperanto are created languages. Italian, German and Arabic are historical languages, evolved over centuries. That their evolution was affected by the diffusion of certain written words I can understand. But they were not created in a book.

Objection!

Volapuk, Esperanto, Italian, German and Arabic are all "created" more or less consciously. The difference lies in its acceptance by the populace and their fortune as vehicle of expression for the elites. If a language is successful, it becomes spoken by many and it gets to have a history. If it is not, cryptographers of today must earn their bread by deciphering what was been said in a certain document.

Arabic was no more than a weird, non-vocalic blabber used by local merchants until something aesthetically pleasing (the Koran) was written in it (adding vocals was a great move, e.g. ) and later it was spread by military conquest.

Luther's printed Bible was distributed by the German princes who were joining the rebellion against the Holy German Empire. That indeed eased the adoption of the common language, which was finally established as we know it today by the Prussian elites in their wars against Austria.

Spanish was eventually given shape by Alfonso X The Wise in his legal codes and game books.

It is true that languages are live things and that they need to be adopted by people. However, there is always a volition, one person or a small group who consciously decides about the core of the language, deep in its roots.

[Nabeel]

I accept FlorenceArt's objections: 'creating' a language is a bit of an exaggeration. Harry is right: the Koran formalised and synthesised existing dialects into a single, more coherent linguistic form - just like Caxton and Dante did for English and Italian.

Legend has it that there were local merchants who were sceptical about Mohammed's thinking, but thought that the language was so beautiful, that they just had to agree.

It's still a poorly-worded question.

Nabeel