Reddit reply in r/AcademicQuran: why do so many analysts find the quran — January 18, 2025 · m7ran9v | Ali Shukri Amin

"The first thing that Western readers are apt to notice about the Qur’an is that it displays neither a linear narrative organisation of the sort familiar from the book of Genesis or the New Testament gospels, nor a topical arrangement like that of the Mishnah. This makes it difficult to give a concise account of the Qur’an’s structure and content. Its basic format is perhaps best characterised as consisting of revelatory addresses treating a wide spectrum of topics (eschatology; the ministry of divine messengers prior to Muhammad, such as Abraham, Moses, and Jesus; God’s creation and maintenance of the natural order; and moral and quasi-legal norms of behaviour) and interweaving a multitude of discursive registers (narrative, hymnic speech, exhortation and admonition, polemics, and casuistic prescription).

Nicolai Sinai, The Quran A Historical Critical Introduction

Todd Lawson,

"Societies are generally seen as producers of texts. Islam suggests that texts areproducers of society, especially texts that record divine revelation from prophets andmessengers. In the genre of literature that deals with the miraculous nature (i`jaz) ofthe Qur’an, various authors have sought to demonstrate the miracle of the Qur’an onvarious grounds: the compelling and matchless esthetic beauty of the Arabic; thequality of information and knowledge contained in the Book, either “scientific” or“religious”; and its miraculous transformative power, by which a new civilizationwas created through the work of devout believers whose souls had been changed. Theunprecedented advance in civilization associated with Islam’s spread is offered assufficient proof. Thus Islamic civilization is seen to have an umbilical relationshipwith the Qur’an as revelation and text. Just as the Qur’an itself speaks of the umm al-kitab, bringing motherhood fully into the divine economy, Muslims and their soci-eties may be seen as children and progeny of the Qur’an, their mother. This veneration of and dependency on the written word is one of the hallmarksof what Hodgson termed “islamicate societies.”

...

To begin this reading, one must adoptthe presupposition that the Qur’an is a profoundly meaningful, unified, and incom-parably beautiful challenge to humanity to a kind of moral excellence frequentlydeemed unfashionable or unrealistic in the postmodern world. In short, one must seeit as the epic of the world of Islam and Muslims, among whose main tasks is explain-ing its teachings to the rest of the world by example and other forms of peaceable andhumane discourse, such as implementing the Book’s challenging behavioral andmoral standards. This epic’s heroes include many of the prophets of the HebrewBible, several previously unknown prophets of Arabia, Jesus Christ, and Muham-mad. Their shared epic drama is the moral regeneration of their respective societies:the journey from savagery and barbarity to culture and civilization. The Qur’an is adistinctive, poetic, and sacred discourse whose epic theme is the simultaneous trans-formation of the individual and society. History, according to the Qur’an, is definedand takes its shape precisely from humanity’s serial and collective responses to thosespecial moral and spiritual athletes known as prophets and divine messengers.

There is another modification of the genrein the instance of the Qur’an. Anyone among the uninitiated who has read it ... andusually the uninitiated will read it in translation ... is struck by an apparent disconti-nuity of the text’s flow: the rhyme and other intensely musical and cohesive aspectsof the Arabic being absent in translation. The Qur’an seems to these readers to be abook without a beginning, a middle, and/or an ending. Additionally, while it is full ofmany discrete accounts and stories populated by heroes familiar and otherwise, thesestories sometimes seem to begin inmedias resand end just as abruptly ... frequentlywithout “dramatic resolution.” This has been one of the features emphasized in sucha derogatory light in the past by a phobic reading of the text. Furthermore, its vari-ous narratives are separated by seeming non sequitursections on legal obligations ofthe individual and the community, by prayers, by apocalyptic visions and, occasion-ally, mysterious and inscrutable allusions and disconnected Arabic letters. Thus, thewhole represents a reading experience quite unparalleled in “the West.”

Lawson, T. (2008). The Qur’an as Matrix of Islamic Civilization and Society. American Journal of Islam and Society, 25(3), i-iv. https://doi.org/10.35632/ajis.v25i3.1452

Neither the Song of the Sea or Song of Deborah would be considered epic poems by the standard definition of an epic poem. One of the main features of an epic poem is it's length (being 18 and 29 verses respectively). They may be narrative poems or have features of an epic poem, but one of the main defining factors of an epic poem is length - hence why I didn't even claim Surah 12 is an epic poem.

>Source that it claims its own unique genre? Source that Surah 12 claims features of epic poetry?

Have you read the Quran? It claims to be an inimitable book that is not poetry or any other created speech of man. It is not prose. I believe Dr. Van Putten typifies it as Saj' (rhymed prose) but it seems clear the Quran goes to lengths not to be compared to any other text.

At this point it seems like you just want me to cite commonsense things from our daily experience, like the fact that Biblical law is no longer a prominent operating legal system and hasn't been for centuries,

"Although Christianity remained a dominant cultural force well into the nineteenth century and beyond, church-state separationists, secularists, and rationalists increasingly challenged its influence on law. This is seen, for example, in bitter political and legal controversies involving the Sunday mails, blasphemy laws, and the Bible’s invocation as authority in judicial proceedings. These disputes signaled Christianity’s declining influence in an increasingly secular age."

Introduction: Christianity and American Law
Great Christian Jurists in American History , pp. 1 - 15
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108609937.002[Opens in a new window]
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

There is no country ruling by Biblical law or quasi-Biblical law that I know of. I don't know when the last time the Bible was the major source of jurisprudence for a nationstate. To this day, the Quran is utilized in lawmaking across the Muslim world. In fact, the Saudi government is currently embarking on a mission to reduce the importance of hadith-derived law in their legal system and have a more Quranic focused approach as described in Vision 2030.