The Ark of the Covenant's Spelling Controversy: A Historical Linguistic Perspective

Abstract

This article examines a famous element in the reports on the canonization of the Qur'anic text under the auspices of Uthman, in which the committee of scribes that were to write the standard text came to a disagreement on how to write the Qur'anic word for at-tabut "Ark." After examining the different versions of the report that contain this episode, and concluding that the report of this episode goes back to the common link of Ibn Šihab al-Zuhri (d. 124/741-2), it is shown that early on the linguistic details of this disagreement were no longer understood. However, by examining how Aramaic and Classical Ethiopic loanwords that end in stem-final -ut or -ot are treated, this report can be understood as referring to two competing adaptations of this foreign word into Arabic. On the one hand at-tabut, the form that ends up in the standard text, and on the other hand at-tabah (or more precisely: at-taboh), which shows a similar strategy of adaptation as several other central loanwords in the Qur'an such as as-salah "prayer" and az-zakah "alms.".