Holy Quran

Muslims believe the Quran to be the book of divine guidance and direction for mankind and consider the text in its original Arabic to be the literal word of God, revealed to Muhammad through the angel Gabriel over a period of twenty-three years and view the Quran as God's final revelation to humanity.

The Christian concept of revelation which means God incarnating and unveiling himself and become visible and audible for mankind is foreign to Islam. Wahy in Islamic and Quranic concept means the act of God addressing an individual, conveying a message for a greater number of recipients. The process by which the divine message comes to the heart of a messenger of God is tanzil (to send down) or nuzul (to come down). As the koran says, "With the truth we (God) have sent it down and with the truth it has come down." It designates positive religion, the letter of the revelation dictated by the angel to the prophet. It means to cause this revelation to descend from the higher world. According to hadith, the verses were sent down in special circumstances known as asbab al-nuzul. However, in this view God himself is never the subject of coming down.

The Quran frequently asserts in its text that it is divinely ordained, an assertion that Muslims believe. The Qur'an often referring to its own textual nature and reflecting constantly on its divine origin is the most meta-textual, self-referential religious text amongst all religious texts. The Holy Quran refers to a written pre-text which records God's speech even before it was sent down.