Quran in English: Modern English Translation. Clear and Easy to Understand.

Review ebook Quran in English: Modern English Translation. Clear and Easy to Understand.

First off, I’m not a believer so I’m not going to review the Quran theologically. I grew up Christian so all my previous religious knowledge comes from the Bible. So that’s how I read the Quran, mostly noticing the similarities and differences from the Bible. And I’m going to just call the deity God because Allah isn’t a name like Yahweh, it’s more of a title (God most high), similar to El Elyon in the Bible.

I encourage anyone with the interest to read the Quran. It is better than hearing people First off, I’m not a believer so I’m not going to review the Quran theologically. I grew up Christian so all my previous religious knowledge comes from the Bible. So that’s how I read the Quran, mostly noticing the similarities and differences from the Bible. And I’m going to just call the deity God because Allah isn’t a name like Yahweh, it’s more of a title (God most high), similar to El Elyon in the Bible.

I encourage anyone with the interest to read the Quran. It is better than hearing people talking about it without knowing what it contains. It’s interesting.

It’s a little long although not nearly as long as the Bible. I’ve heard people say it’s about the same length as the new testament in the Bible. It’s a bit repetitive. The chapters are organized with the longer ones first. Toward the end, the chapters are sometimes just a page long or less.

I have a pretty intimate knowledge of the more popular Christian sects. So if you know anything about Calvinism, you could say that God is definitely a Calvinist in the Quran. There are a number of passages that denigrate non believers but usually follow by saying that if God wanted you to believe, you would definitely believe.

Similarly to the Bible, there are a lot of passages that take natural earth processes, like plants growing and rain falling and use that as an argument for God’s existence. Some verses say that the sky is being held up by God. Noting that it would fall down on us if not for God.

In terms of storytelling, I found the Bible (other than the “begats” passages) a lot more entertaining. I think the Bible lends itself better to those children’s Bibles we were all so fond of as children. There is a lot of detail in the Bible narratives compared to the Quran. It’s important to note however, that the same narratives and characters you find in the Bible are also in the Quran. Adam, Eve, Noah, Abraham, Ishmael, Moses, Jonah, Lot, even Jesus and Mary. So I always find it interesting when you hear people talk about the Quranic God and the Biblical God as 2 separate deities. If they are separate, it’s certainly coincidental that they share the same cast of characters and stories. And the Quran seems to treat the old testament of the Bible as scripture. There is a lot of emphasis on the Israelites not obeying God, etc.

If you didn’t know before, the big sticking point between Islam and Christianity is the Trinity. The Quran is very focused on monotheism. It attacks the Trinity head on. It talks about how God doesn’t have any children. It does however have a special place for Jesus. It definitely venerates Jesus and has him do miracles and even talk in his crib, it just doesn’t present him as equal to God almighty. I thought in that way the theology was a lot simpler. If you talk to Christians about the Trinity, you are likely to hear many different definitions. There is just one God and he’s the ultimate is certainly easier to understand. Again, I believe gods are man-made creations. I’m speaking as an outsider as to the simplicity of the theology, not to the truthfulness of the claims.

Regarding Hell, the Bible’s references are actually few and far between. Christians have a pretty firm picture of it based on church attendance I believe. But the Quran is different. It mentions Hell constantly. There are details about drinking boiling water and being burnt. There is a lot of talk about how regretful you will be when you end up there. You’ll want another chance to believe for sure.

Christian Protestants focus a lot about ‘justification by faith.’ They won’t really say it like this but if you follow what Paul says, you basically just need to believe in Jesus to get into Heaven. The Quran does insist you believe but you also have to act on it. It’s beliefs + works as far as I can tell.

In our current age of islamic terrorism, I would be remiss not to talk about that aspect of the Quran. I pretty much read the whole thing and kept thinking – wait where were all the verses saying to kill the infidels? I found an anti-islamic website and went through all the verses they said talked about jihad and fighting and highlighted them in my kindle. I knew they were in there but I think it’s similar to the Bible where people just blow over all the genocide in the old testament. When I was reading the narrative, it was more subtle than jumping to those verses individually. If you are so inclined, you can certainly find justification by God to kill non-believers or polytheists. God’s really hates them in the Quran. It says that explicitly. I do wonder if some of the more explicit commands are in the Hadith(s) as opposed to only the Quran itself but I’m too lazy to read the Hadith(s).

Satan is interesting in the Quran. When Adam was created, God asked all the angels to bow before him but Satan refused saying something like, “I’m not bowing to a lesser being!” which caused the rift with God. I couldn’t really make sense out of Satan’s role in the Quran. He seems like a tempter but then God is supreme. I have the same confusion with Christian Calvinism. I can’t figure out where God’s sovereignty ends and Satan’s power begins.

Bottom line, I read it and i’m not convinced to become a Muslim 😉 and thank God it’s short enough to get through. If it was as long as the Bible I couldn’t have done it. Read it for yourself and see what you think!
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