Having apparently fallen out with some of his former allies like MS Baba, Akanbi Oloba, etc, in thier secret pact against Islam in Yorubaland, Noah Ezekiel, a Nigerian Christian apologist, has in recent days been exhibiting a rather elementary misunderstanding of al-Qirāʾāt—the canonical modes of Qur’anic recitation—and attempting to present them as contradictions in the Qur’an.
His argument seems to amount to something like this:
“If Muslims say there are contradictions in the Bible, then there are contradictions in your Qur’an too. So leave the Bible alone.”
That argument would only work if the things he presents as “contradictions” were actually contradictions.
They are not.
Indeed, the irony is that his attempt to attack the Qur’an through its canonical readings demonstrates precisely why one should not venture into the sciences of the Qur’an without first learning their foundations.
Let us begin with the most basic point.
The Qur’an is one Book: from Sūrat al-Fātiḥah to Sūrat al-Nās. It consists of 114 sūrahs. The existence of canonical qirāʾāt does not mean that Muslims possess ten different Qur’ans.
The Qur’an itself declares:
إِنَّا نَحْنُ نَزَّلْنَا الذِّكْرَ وَإِنَّا لَهُ لَحَافِظُونَ
“Verily, We: It is We Who have sent down the Dhikr (i.e. the Qur’an) and surely, We will guard it (from corruption).”
(Qur’an 15:9)
Allah also says:
لَا يَأْتِيهِ الْبَاطِلُ مِنْ بَيْنِ يَدَيْهِ وَلَا مِنْ خَلْفِهِ
“Falsehood cannot approach it from before it or from behind it.”
(Qur’an 41:42)
And He challenges mankind to reflect upon the Qur’an:
أَفَلَا يَتَدَبَّرُونَ الْقُرْآنَ ۚ وَلَوْ كَانَ مِنْ عِندِ غَيْرِ اللَّهِ لَوَجَدُوا فِيهِ اخْتِلَافًا كَثِيرًا
“Do they not then consider the Qur’an carefully? Had it been from other than Allah, they would surely have found therein much contradiction.”
(Qur’an 4:82)
Notice the argument of the verse: real contradiction would be evidence against divine authorship. Therefore, if someone wishes to establish a contradiction in the Qur’an, he must first demonstrate an actual contradiction—not merely produce two canonical readings and declare, “Look! They are different!”
That is not how contradiction works.
Where did the different readings come from?
The different canonical readings are not medieval inventions manufactured by Muslim scholars after the Prophet ﷺ.
The Prophet ﷺ himself taught the Companions different forms of Qur’anic recitation.
Consider the famous narration of ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb رضي الله عنه.
He heard Hishām ibn Ḥakīm رضي الله عنه reciting Sūrat al-Furqān in a manner different from the manner in which ʿUmar had been taught to recite it by the Messenger of Allah ﷺ.
ʿUmar initially thought Hishām was mistaken. After Hishām completed his prayer, ʿUmar brought him before the Prophet ﷺ and explained what had happened.
The Prophet ﷺ instructed Hishām to recite.
After hearing him, the Prophet ﷺ said:
هَكَذَا أُنْزِلَتْ
“It was revealed to be recited in this way.”
He then asked ʿUmar to recite. After hearing his recitation, the Prophet ﷺ likewise said:
هَكَذَا أُنْزِلَتْ
“It was revealed to be recited in this way.”
Then he said:
إِنَّ الْقُرْآنَ أُنْزِلَ عَلَى سَبْعَةِ أَحْرُفٍ، فَاقْرَءُوا مَا تَيَسَّرَ مِنْهُ
“The Qur’an was revealed upon seven aḥruf, so recite whichever of them is easy for you.”
This is Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 4992 and 5041, and Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim 818a.
So the basic principle is not something Muslims invented to rescue themselves from a modern Christian apologist.
It predates the modern Christian apologists by approximately fourteen centuries.
And there is an important technical point here:
Do not confuse the seven aḥruf with the ten qirāʾāt.
The aḥruf mentioned in the Prophetic narrations and the ten canonical qirāʾāt of the later science of Qur’anic recitation are related subjects, but they are not simply synonymous terms.
The ten qirāʾāt refer to the canonical recitational traditions transmitted through leading reciters such as Nāfiʿ, Ibn Kathīr, Abū ʿAmr, Ibn ʿĀmir, ʿĀṣim, Ḥamzah, al-Kisāʾī, Abū Jaʿfar, Yaʿqūb and Khalaf, each transmitted through recognised chains and specific transmitters.
Thus, when someone displays copies of the Qur’an according to the ten qirāʾāt and says, “Look! Ten different Qur’ans!”, he has already demonstrated that he does not understand the terminology of the discipline he is criticising.
The Qur’an was made easy to recite
Allah says:
وَلَقَدْ يَسَّرْنَا الْقُرْآنَ لِلذِّكْرِ فَهَلْ مِنْ مُدَّكِرٍ
“And We have indeed made the Qur’an easy to understand and remember, then is there any that will remember?”
(Qur’an 54:17)
He also says:
فَإِنَّمَا يَسَّرْنَاهُ بِلِسَانِكَ لَعَلَّهُمْ يَتَذَكَّرُونَ
“Certainly, We have made this Qur’an easy in your tongue, in order that they may remember.”
(Qur’an 44:58)
The Qur’anic revelation was delivered to an Arab people whose linguistic circumstances included differences in pronunciation and usage. The revealed aḥruf accommodated legitimate variations in recitation.
But it would be an oversimplification to say that the ten qirāʾāt are merely “ten Arabic dialects.” The science is much more sophisticated than that.
Among the phenomena studied within the qirāʾāt are matters such as al-imālah, at-taqlīl, at-tas'hīl, al-ishmām, ar-raum, al-madd, and other recognised differences of pronunciation, vocalisation, morphology and, in some cases, wording.
This is an enormous science.
And that is precisely why one ought to learn it before attempting to use it as ammunition against the Qur’an.
Take Sūrat al-Fātiḥah
Consider the famous reading:
مَالِكِ يَوْمِ الدِّينِ
and the reading:
مَلِكِ يَوْمِ الدِّينِ
Mālik conveys the meaning of Owner/Master, while Malik means King.
Is this a contradiction?
Of course not.
Allah is the Owner of the Day of Judgement—and He is its King.
The two readings therefore add complementary meanings rather than cancelling one another.
This is an example of what scholars describe as ikhtilāf at-tanawwuʿ—variation that enriches meaning—rather than ikhtilāf at-taḍādd, contradictory variation in which one statement necessarily negates the other.
The critic who sees two words and immediately shouts “contradiction!” has confused difference with contradiction.
Those are not synonyms.
Another example: al-Baqarah 2:222
Allah says regarding menstruation:
وَلَا تَقْرَبُوهُنَّ حَتَّىٰ يَطْهُرْنَ فَإِذَا تَطَهَّرْنَ فَأْتُوهُنَّ مِنْ حَيْثُ أَمَرَكُمُ اللَّهُ
There is a recognised qirāʾah in:
حَتَّىٰ يَطْهُرْنَ
meaning that menstruation has ceased,
and another:
حَتَّىٰ يَطَّهَّرْنَ
which indicates purification through ritual bathing.
The canonical readings are documented in the qirāʾāt literature.
This is exactly the kind of precision required when discussing the qirāʾāt.
Now let us come to the passage Noah Ezekiel is brandishing
This is where the argument becomes particularly revealing.
The passage is Sūrat al-Ṣāffāt 37:11–14:
فَاسْتَفْتِهِمْ أَهُمْ أَشَدُّ خَلْقًا أَمْ مَنْ خَلَقْنَا ۚ إِنَّا خَلَقْنَاهُمْ مِنْ طِينٍ لَازِبٍ
بَلْ عَجِبْتَ وَيَسْخَرُونَ
وَإِذَا ذُكِّرُوا لَا يَذْكُرُونَ
وَإِذَا رَأَوْا آيَةً يَسْتَسْخِرُونَ
“And ask them: Are they a stronger creation or those others We have created? Indeed, We created them from sticky clay.
Rather, you are amazed, while they mock.
And when they are reminded, they pay no attention.
And when they see a sign, they ridicule it.”
The familiar reading is:
بَلْ عَجِبْتَ وَيَسْخَرُونَ
“Rather, you are amazed, while they mock.”
Here ʿajibta is second person masculine singular, addressing the Prophet ﷺ.
But there is another canonical reading:
بَلْ عَجِبْتُ وَيَسْخَرُونَ
“Rather, I am amazed, while they mock.”
Here ʿajibtu is first person singular. The verb is therefore attributed to Allah سبحانه وتعالى.
The two readings are explicitly recorded among the canonical qirāʾāt.
So what exactly is the alleged contradiction?
“You are amazed” versus “I am amazed”
Let us slow down.
In one canonical recitation, Allah tells us that the Prophet ﷺ is amazed at the behaviour of those who reject and mock.
In another canonical recitation, Allah Himself describes the matter as something at which He is ʿajab.
These are not mutually exclusive propositions.
They can both be true simultaneously.
Indeed, the context itself makes the matter intelligible:
The Prophet ﷺ is amazed at their obstinate rejection, while Allah expresses His own ʿajab concerning their rejection and mockery.
One reading draws attention to the reaction of the Messenger ﷺ.
The other draws attention to the divine description.
There is no logical contradiction between:
“Zayd was amazed at what they did”
and
“Allah expressed ʿajab at what they did.”
For the two statements to contradict one another, one would have to entail the negation of the other.
It does not.
And this is precisely why the science of qirāʾāt cannot be reduced to the childish formula:
“The word changed, therefore the Qur’an contradicted itself.”
No.
Sometimes the variation expands the semantic field.
Sometimes it gives another grammatical possibility.
Sometimes it conveys an additional nuance.
Sometimes one reading explains or complements another.
And sometimes the readings provide different but perfectly compatible perspectives on the same reality.
That is not textual corruption.
That is transmitted revelation.
And notice something even more interesting
The reading عَجِبْتُ is not an invention of a modern Muslim apologist trying to rescue the Qur’an after the fact.
It is part of the canonical recitational tradition itself. The qirāʾāt sources identify the reciters and transmitters through whom these readings are preserved.
So the Christian apologist has a choice.
He can either learn the science of qirāʾāt and engage with what Muslims actually believe, or he can continue presenting canonical readings as though Muslims discovered them yesterday after his latest social-media post.
But the latter is not scholarship.
“Ta” and “tu” do not constitute a contradiction
Much of the argument appears to depend upon making the audience stare at the letters:
عَجِبْتَ
versus
عَجِبْتُ
and then asking:
“Which one is correct?”
The Muslim answer is:
Both are correct within their respective canonical recitations.
And the reason is not that Muslims are desperately trying to make two incompatible statements compatible.
It is because the Messenger of Allah ﷺ taught different authorised forms of Qur’anic recitation to his Companions.
ʿUmar's own experience with Hishām is the clearest demonstration of this. Two Companions recited differently, each insisting that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ had taught him his recitation—and the Prophet ﷺ authenticated both.
That should make anyone pause before confidently announcing that every variation in Qur’anic recitation is a “contradiction.”
Now compare this with the standard of contradiction
A contradiction is not simply:
“A is expressed differently from B.”
A contradiction exists when two propositions cannot both be true under the same circumstances and in the same respect.
For example, if one text says:
“David was 30 years old”
and another says:
“David was 50 years old”
about the same David at the same point in time, you have a genuine numerical conflict.
But if one reading says:
“You are amazed”
and another says:
“I am amazed,”
there is no contradiction merely because the grammatical subject changes.
The question is whether the propositions mutually exclude one another.
They do not.
If you want to see contradictions, then welcome to the Bible:
Genesis 1 presents vegetation on the third day, birds and sea creatures on the fifth, and land animals and mankind on the sixth, with man and woman created together in the climax of the account.
Genesis 2 presents Adam before the woman and contains an account involving the garden, the animals being brought to Adam, and the creation of the woman.
Noah, that is a clear contradiction!
Who incited David to conduct the census?
2 Samuel 24:1 says:
“Again the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel, and he incited David against them…”
But 1 Chronicles 21:1 says:
“Then Satan stood against Israel and incited David to number Israel.”
The two passages explicitly identify different agents.
How many fighting men were counted?
2 Samuel 24:9 gives:
- Israel: 800,000
- Judah: 500,000
while 1 Chronicles 21:5 gives:
- Israel: 1,100,000
- Judah: 470,000.
Those are not differences in pronunciation.
They are different numerical figures.
How long was the threatened famine?
2 Samuel 24:13 mentions seven years of famine.
1 Chronicles 21:12 mentions three years.
Again, this is a substantive difference in the numerical information presented by the two accounts.
Has anyone seen God?
Genesis 32:30 records Jacob saying:
“I have seen God face to face…”
and Exodus 33:11 says that the LORD spoke to Moses “face to face.”
Yet John 1:18 says:
“No man hath seen God at any time,”
while 1 Timothy 6:16 describes God as the One “whom no man hath seen, nor can see.”
The Qur’an itself invites examination
Allah does not tell people:
“Do not think about the Qur’an.”
Quite the opposite.
He says:
أَفَلَا يَتَدَبَّرُونَ الْقُرْآنَ
“Do they not then reflect upon the Qur’an?”
And then He gives a striking test:
وَلَوْ كَانَ مِنْ عِندِ غَيْرِ اللَّهِ لَوَجَدُوا فِيهِ اخْتِلَافًا كَثِيرًا
“Had it been from other than Allah, they would surely have found therein much contradiction.”
(Qur’an 4:82)
So by all means, investigate.
Question.
Compare.
Study the Arabic.
Study the qirāʾāt.
Study the transmission.
Study the tafsīr.
Study the history of the text.
But please do not take a sophisticated fourteen-century-old science, reduce it to “one says ta, another says tu,” and then announce that you have discovered a contradiction in the Qur’an.
You have not.
You have merely discovered that the Qur’an has canonical modes of recitation which you had not previously studied.
The Qur’an came through Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, who was described as ummī—unlettered.
Allah says:
هُوَ الَّذِي بَعَثَ فِي الْأُمِّيِّينَ رَسُولًا مِنْهُمْ يَتْلُو عَلَيْهِمْ آيَاتِهِ وَيُزَكِّيهِمْ وَيُعَلِّمُهُمُ الْكِتَابَ وَالْحِكْمَةَ
“It is He Who has sent among the unlettered a Messenger from themselves, reciting to them His Verses, purifying them and teaching them the Book and wisdom…”
(Qur’an 62:2)
And Allah says:
وَمَا كُنْتَ تَتْلُو مِنْ قَبْلِهِ مِنْ كِتَابٍ وَلَا تَخُطُّهُ بِيَمِينِكَ
“You did not read any scripture before this, nor did you write one with your right hand…”
(Qur’an 29:48)
The Qur’an was therefore not the product of Muhammad ﷺ sitting down as an author and experimenting with alternative spellings and readings.
It was revelation, recited, taught, memorised and transmitted.
And one of the remarkable features of that transmission is precisely the preservation of the canonical recitations that the Prophet ﷺ taught.
So, Noah, before turning عَجِبْتَ and عَجِبْتُ into a social-media spectacle, perhaps sit down and learn what qirāʾah, riwāyah, ṭarīq, ḥarf, and tawātur actually mean.
The subject is wider than two or three video shows.
And considerably deeper than a viral argument.
The Qur’an has survived scholars, kingdoms, empires, polemicists and apologists for fourteen centuries.
It does not need to be rescued from ta and tu.
What is needed is for the critic to study before he criticises.
May Allah open our hearts to the truth, guide those who sincerely seek it, and increase us all in beneficial knowledge.
