Section: On the alteration that has affected the wording of the Torah and the Gospel and the interruption of their chains of transmission.

Among the proofs advanced by the majority—those who deny that every expression of the earlier scriptures now in the hands of the People of the Book was sent down from Allah unchanged—is their claim that alteration has indeed touched parts of those texts and that we possess no certain knowledge that their present wording is divine revelation. Therefore, the phrases they contain cannot be cited as evidence against what is known with certainty. They state:

“The Torah and the Gospel now held by the People of the Book have not been conveyed through tawatur (mass-transmission) from Moses and Jesus—peace be upon them. As for the Torah, its transmission was severed when the Temple was first destroyed and the Children of Israel were expelled. They further report that the one who later dictated it to them was a single individual named Ezra, whom they claim was a prophet.”